TakingITGlobal

For 8 weeks prior to the IPCC Cities and Climate Change Conference, participating students worked through a mix of in-school and online activities, to which they responded via blog posts. Mentors, including youths' teachers and the undergraduate researchers who conducted the study reported on here, guided students throughout the process by responding to blog posts and encouraging students to read the posts of others. localized study, each school was paired with another school in a different context (i.e. global North and global South) for bilateral collaboration, which involved each school working closely together explore a topic using online tools such as Google Docs, WhatsApp, Skype, or Messenger, according to student preferences. Next, students shared their learning from their bilateral projects via videoconference within three continental groupings, including students from (a) South, Central, and North America; (b) Africa and Europe; (c) Asia and Oceania. Within these videoconferences, students responded to each other's ideas and received feedback from facilitators. Students prepared their final findings for a global virtual town hall, where they all engaged together via videoconference. Following the online collaborations, one student delegate from each school was invited to Edmonton, Canada, along with a teacher chaperone, to synthesize the work from the full project into the International Youth White Paper on Climate Change: Education and Cities, and to present on a public stage at the conference, "Throughout the process, the facilitator worked to keep her voice out of the paper, focusing instead on asking critical questions, directing students to additional resources, and ensuring students worked on the components of the paper about which they were most interested and knowledgeable." Curriculum focused on diverse city contexts planet-wide, asking students to consider (a) the impacts of climate change on cities; (b) underlying assumptions and power dynamics in climate justice; (c) civic, national, and global systems and structures in climate issues; and (d) informed, critical, and ethically responsible engagement in climate justice. Though it was provided in English, curriculum content aspired to be international by providing case studies from various contexts around the world. Students initially explored local topics, so that they might come to understand how their own beliefs and assumptions are constructed before engaging with the ideas of others. Following a period of 1.1 CURRICULUM | 07 Y O U T H A N D C L I M A T E C H A N G E 2 0 1 8 E D I T I O N

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