[Factc] CCs Educating Students to Live in a Changing Climate

[MacGregor, Jean]

Hi everyone,

Five years ago, the Curriculum for the Bioregion initiative (which I directed at the time) conducted a survey of colleges and universities in Western Washington that invited faculty respondents to identify what they were teaching/emphasizing with respect to climate change and climate solutions. Over 340 faculty members (from 19 community colleges and 11 universities) responded.  It was not a comprehensive survey but it *did* provide a snapshot of what was being taught a few years ago.  Attached is a brief summary of the survey results; if any of you would like to see the full report, write me and I'll send it to you.

In the 2016-17 academic year, the Curriculum for the Bioregion project convened a faculty learning community, "Teaching in an Age of Climate Consequences."  The 40+ participants spent the year sharing ideas for helping students embrace the cognitive complexity of climate change, as well as the emotional undertow associated with studying a daunting problem. Some of their shared ideas are online at the Curriculum for the Bioregion's curriculum collection: https://serc.carleton.edu/bioregion/index.html

Our colleague David Blockstein (at the Association of Environmental Studies and Sciences) has opined, "The glaciers are melting faster than the curriculum is changing."  So true!  If our colleagues and universities cannot lead the way toward climate solutions, who will?  In too many respects, we are still preparing students for the century that ended 18 years ago.


Jean



Jean MacGregor

(Retired) Director, Curriculum for the Bioregion

Washington Center for Undergraduate Education

The Evergreen State College

E-mail: macgjean at evergreen.edu<mailto:macgjean at evergreen.edu>



________________________________
From: Jennifer Whetham [jwhetham at sbctc.edu]
Sent: Wednesday, October 31, 2018 3:10 PM
To: atlc at lists.ctc.edu; 'factc at lists.ctc.edu'; wpa-l at lists.asu.edu; 'dehpd-wactc at googlegroups.com'; discussion at podnetwork.org; learningcommunitiesassociation at freelists.org; MacGregor, Jean
Cc: MELODY SCHNEIDER
Subject: CCs Educating Students to Live in a Changing Climate

Dear Friends and Colleagues (Aka the Hive Mind):

One of the wonderful faculty leaders for student learning, Melody Schneider of Edmonds CC, wrote to me with the following inquiry: In light of the UN report on climate change issued recently, and because of the classes I teach that investigate climate change data . . .

How can our colleges prepare our students to live in a changing climate?

Melody found an interesting report<https://secondnature.org/wp-content/uploads/Higher_Education_Role_Adapting_Changing_Climate.pdf> from several years ago about how colleges could lead . . . however, other than work at University of Washington, she found nothing about the role community colleges play in educating students for the future in a changed climate.

Melody’s Ask: Do you know of or have heard about any groups who are working on this issue?
Please respond to Melody at melody.schneider at email.edcc.edu<mailto:melody.schneider at email.edcc.edu>
________________________________

[Title: SBCTC logo - Description: Compass]Jennifer Whetham (pronouns: she/her/hers)
Assessment, Teaching, and Learning
Washington State Board for Community and Technical Colleges
jwhetham at sbctc.edu<mailto:jwhetham at sbctc.edu> • o: 360-704-4354 • c: 206-310-1291
Register Now for the 2018 New Faculty Institute<http://bit.ly/2kGygBt>

“I’m not interested in the exceptions, only the patterns. As a culture, we (the U.S.) focus too much on exceptions, often fooling ourselves into believing that because there are exceptions, the rule no longer exists or that it’s easily broken by anyone with enough willpower or hutzpah.”

[*]     Asao B. Inoue, Antiracist Writing Assessment Ecologies<http://bit.ly/2xvacY4>

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://lists.ctc.edu/pipermail/factc_lists.ctc.edu/attachments/20181031/b54e36fd/attachment-0002.html>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image001.gif
Type: image/gif
Size: 663 bytes
Desc: image001.gif
URL: <http://lists.ctc.edu/pipermail/factc_lists.ctc.edu/attachments/20181031/b54e36fd/attachment-0002.gif>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: image003.png
Type: image/png
Size: 15661 bytes
Desc: image003.png
URL: <http://lists.ctc.edu/pipermail/factc_lists.ctc.edu/attachments/20181031/b54e36fd/attachment-0002.png>
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: C4B Climate Change Survey Summary_2013.pdf
Type: application/pdf
Size: 81987 bytes
Desc: C4B Climate Change Survey Summary_2013.pdf
URL: <http://lists.ctc.edu/pipermail/factc_lists.ctc.edu/attachments/20181031/b54e36fd/attachment-0002.pdf>