This past summer, the Chicago Teachers Union held a collective bargaining session in which they advocated for something unprecedented: their students’ right to a sustainable future.
As the CTU recognized, we can’t teach our kids on a planet that is uninhabitable. Furthermore, if we as educators claim to have our kids’ best interest at heart, we owe them an Earth they can live on.
These two immutable facts mean that we, as educators, have a special place in the fight against climate change. As educators, we have a vested interest in the health and well-being of our students. This directly translates to a vested interest in mitigating climate change. How can we claim to sincerely care about our students if we fail to address the crisis that threatens their food and water security? Their safety from hurricanes and wildfires? Their ability to have a home to live in, or even a habitable planet to live on? If we care about our children of this generation and future generations, we must take action against climate change.
To be clear, the effects of climate change are already being felt. Our own state’s devastation in the wake of Hurricane Helene is a reminder of the increasing intensity and frequency of severe storms in a warmer world. We still have a chance to mitigate the worst effects of climate change, however, and set our planet on a better path for generations yet unborn.
But drastic and decisive action is sorely needed. As of the time of writing this article, the world is not on track to meet its emissions targets. In fact, we’re on track for warming greater than 2.5C - which the UN warns would be “debilitating” for the planet and all life upon it. And at the federal level, opponents of climate action are actively undermining and dismantling some of our strongest tools to fight climate change.
Despite this urgent need for action, only 37% of U.S. Americans say that addressing climate change should be a top priority for our country. This puts our country in the lowest third out of the top fifteen carbon emitters in the world, according to a Yale Program on Climate Change Communication study.
The only way that improves is with better education about climate change.
In recognition of this fact, NCAE has joined its other unions from around the nation, such as California and Massachusetts, in starting to take action for environmental justice. With the formation of NCAE’s Environmental Justice committee, a group of dedicated educators will be tasked with helping educators identify ways to integrate progress for climate change and environmental justice into their context, from elementary to high school and across every discipline. Regardless of who you are or your role in education, you are needed in the fight for a future with a healthy, thriving planet.
Environmental justice is where equity and environmentalism intersect. Environmental justice arises from the recognition that the harms of environmental degradation often fall hardest on the marginalized, though they often are least responsible for such degradation. Such is the case with climate change, where those who will suffer most from climate change in the developing world contribute least to carbon emissions, relative to wealthy countries.
Expect communication in the coming months from the Environmental Justice Committee about how to take action, as an educator, against climate change. And if you are interested in joining the committee, reach out to Robert Alvis at [email protected]. We would love to have you join the fight for a healthy, thriving planet.
- The NCAE Environmental Justice Committee
