GLOBAL CHALLENGES IN
DELIVERING CLIMATEEDUCATIONTHE GOALS AND SCOPE OF CLIMATEEDUCATION, WAYS TO BUILD CAPACITY IN
ITS DELIVERY, AND HOW TO INTEGRATE IT
INTO EXISTING TEACHING FRAMEWORKS
Mark S. McCaffrey
Senior Research Fellow

Institute for Sustainable Development Studies, Budapest, Hungary

orFinding the Sweet
Spot for Climate
Action andEngagement
In order to reduce climate
risks and optimize resilienceECO-SYSTEM
Education(Literacy)

Integrated
Education,
Communication& Outreach forEngagement &Action

SweetSpot
Communication

Outreach

Building Community & Capacity

Climate Education,
Communication andOutreach Date to 1957-1958

NAS

Human Impacts on Greenhouse Effect“Our industrialcivilization has
been pouring
carbon dioxide
into theatmosphere at agreat rate....

If it remained, itwould have amarked warming
effect on theearth’s climate…

Conceivably… it could
cause significant
melting of the great
icecaps and raise sea
levels in time.”
Planet Earth: The Mystery with 100,000 Clues
National Academy of Sciences

1958

Bell Science HourProduced by Frank CapraFeb. 2, 1962

CLIMATE EDUCATION INTEGRAL TO UNFCCC
ARTICLE 6: EDUCATION, TRAINING AND PUBLIC AWARENESS
In carrying out their commitments under Article 4, paragraph 1(i),the Parties shall:(a)Promote and facilitate…
(i) The development and implementation of educational andpublic awareness programmes on climate change and its
effects;(ii) Public access to information on climate change and its
effects;(iii)Public participation in addressing climate change and its
effects and developing adequate responses; and(iv) Training of scientific, technical and managerial personnel.

Plus international collaboration andcooperation to achieve the above

FastForwardto 1992

“Public participation inaddressing climatechange and its effects
and developingadequate responses…”

Public Attitudes towards Climate Change andOther Environmental Issues across Time and Countries, 1993-2010

Tom W. Smith & Jibum Kim (2013)• Increased education = increased concern• Concern declines with age, increases with youth• Higher income is associated with seeing it as mostimportant• Right-wing political parties less concerned about it

EFFORTS TO REVITALIZE ARTICLE 6 STRUGGLE• Doha Work Programme sets
new requirements (2012)• Ministerial Declaration from
LIMA COP20 (2014)• Article 6 renamed as ACE(Action for ClimateEmpowerment)• Few countries include education in their NDC plans• ACE Focal Points need support

UN CC: LEARN
The One UN Climate
Change LearningPartnership• Broad scope andpotential• Limited capacity due
mainly to funding
constraints

CEB, EMG, FAO,GEF Secretariat,
IDB, IFAD, ILO,ITU, IMO, ITU,OCHA, UNAIDS,UNDP, UNECA,UNECE, UN
Environment,UNESCO,UNESCWA,UNECE, UNFCCC,UNFPA, UNHCR,
UN-HABITAT,UNICEF, UNIDO,UNISDR, UNITAR,UNSSC, UNU, UN
WOMEN, UNWTO,UPU, WFP, WHO,WMO, WTO, andthe World Bankhttp://cleanet.org

Established in 2016 at COP24
An official UNFCCC Community

ECOS STAKEHOLDERS INVOLVED WITH ACE

Survey conducted in 2018

KEY GOALS OF ECOS STAKEHOLDERS
●●●●
●
●

Awareness raising
EducatingTutoringProviding information
Youth empowerment
Capacity building

OBSTACLESWHY THE LACK OF CLIMATE LITERACY ?
• Climate is complex and interdisciplinary(falls through disciplinary cracks)• Some degree of controversy about science(vested interests) and value of education• Do top-down UNFCCC negotiations bias
toward elite experts (not publicengagement)?
• No money/profits in climate literacyPowers of 10: Scaling Climate Action Strategies across Society

Bhowmik and McCaffrey et al.
Forthcoming

EDUCATION IN
THE POWERS
OF 10Literacy Building,Information Sharing,Messages/Motivation need tobe localizedEngagement andInnovation alsoneed local context

PUBLISHED: 05 FEBRUARY 2018

NATURE SUSTAINABILITYA GOOD LIFE FOR ALL WITHIN PLANETARY BOUNDARIESO’NEILL, FANNING, LAMB & STEINBERGER

Education as key factor

KEY FINDINGS• Social goals that relate directly to meeting physicalneeds (nutrition, income, access to energy andsanitation) tightly coupled to resource use.
• Improvements could likely be achieved for all
people without significantly exceeding planetary
boundaries.

• An important exception is secondary
education, which is both strongly coupled
to resource use and associated with high

MEANING: EDUCATION ITSELF CAN BE
A MAJOR PART OF THE PROBLEM
Transforming all
education tosustainable/
regenerativeeducation isimperative#TeachSDGs

Continue theConversation
Join the ECOS Facebook Group:https://www.facebook.com/groups/ClimateECOS/

marksmccaffrey@gmail.com

“To changesomething, builda new modelthat makes theexisting modelobsolete.”― Richard Buckminster
Fuller