Educating with resilience in mind: Addressing climate change in post-Sandy New York City

Abstract

How educators adapt their programs following a climate related disturbance can provide insights into potential climate education practices. Therefore, we used semi-structured interviews to explore changes in environmental education practice in NYC following Hurricane Sandy. Educators adopted new language to reflect funding opportunities and incorporated new practices and collaborations, including those focused on resilience. Educators' resilience practices reflected the psychological, community, ecological, and socialecological systems resilience academic literature. Overall practice changes appeared to be adaptive, although some educators reflected more deeply about transforming their practice. Our findings point to the need for further exchange among practitioners facing climate-related disturbance, and between practitioners and researchers, to facilitate co-production of EE practice innovations that address climate change.

Environmental perception and activities in environmental education based on socio-ecological resilience

“…The overall discussion is in line with state-of-the art proposals in environmental education, which are supported by the education with resilience (DUBOIS, KRASNY, 2016) and the idea of shared values (IRVINE et al, 2016). According to this latter approach, individual values should be recognized, understood as part of the complexity ISSN-1413-8638 E-ISSN -2238-5533 v. 22, n. 1, p. 314-332, 2017 …”

Climate adaptation education: embracing reality or abandoning environmental values

“…All the programs engaged in adaptation efforts focused on restoring ecosystems services or other means of improving environmental quality. Although the restoration programs also addressed greenhouse gas reduction indirectly through carbon sequestration by plants, only two programs incorporated efforts to directly reduce greenhouse gasses through promoting solar energy; the preponderance of restoration activities may be an artifact of our sample, which was limited to programs that emphasized resilience (Dubois and Krasny 2016). The NYC programs are presented in contrast to educational efforts that focus on disaster response, safety, or how plants and animals adapt to climate change in ways that are not consistent with EE's tradition of enhancing environmental quality.…”

“…programs that focused on building persistence or 'grit' in youth) and social-ecological systems (e.g. dune restoration) resilience (Dubois and Krasny 2016). Social-ecological systems resilience, which incorporates notions of adaptation and transformation in the face of ongoing change (Folke et al 2002), may be particularly useful in thinking about EE's role in climate change mitigation, adaptation, and education.…”

“…The social side is just as important to strengthen as to hardening our coastline. I'm sitting in East village that has the 'BIG U' coming and it's a perfect example as something that I believe that community voices can improve and be a good model in itself… Interestingly, the Green Map educator also spoke about resilience, a term that was used by educators to refer variously to psychological, community, ecological, and social-ecological processes of recovery and transformation (Dubois and Krasny 2016). Because definitions of resilience across all these levels include notions of adapting and thriving in response to hardship and disruptions, resilience provides a useful lens for thinking about education, adaptation and transformation in light of climate change.…”

“…We conducted a two-stage study of how EE programs in NYC are changing in response to Hurricane Sandy, the detailed results of which are reported in Dubois and Krasny (2016). In the first stage we interviewed educators from 44 EE organizations and found that a common EE practice change was incorporating resilience into EE programs.…”