From Principles to Practice: New Resources for Teaching Climate Education
This webinar took place on January 23, 2025 at 3:00 PM ET.
Three climate change education experts share materials to advance climate change education: Frank Niepold, NOAA’s Senior Climate Education Program Manager, Dr. Bora Simmons, Director of the Project for Excellence Program of NAAEE, and Michael Kozuch from MIT’s climate education group.
Our speakers discussed:
- NOAA’s recently-released "Climate Literacy: Essential Principles for Understanding and Addressing Climate Change"
- NAAEE’s Educating for Climate Action and Justice, the latest module in the Guidelines for Excellence series
- New high-school climate change lesson plans from MIT that are free and easy to use
- Additional resources from NAAEE and NOAA that can support climate education at all levels
All registrants will receive the recording of this webinar. Additional resources coming soon!
Speakers:
Dr. Bora Simmons, Director of the Project for Excellence Program of NAAEE
Bora Simmons serves as the founding director of the National Project for Excellence in Environmental Education. The North American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE) initiated the Project in 1993 to help educators develop and deliver effective environmental education programs. The Project has drawn on the insights of literally thousands of educators across the United States and around the world to craft guidelines for top-quality environmental education.
Frank Niepold, NOAA’s Senior Climate Education Program Manager
Frank Niepold is the climate education coordinator at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Climate Program Office in Silver Spring, Maryland. Niepold also leads the education section of NOAA's public data and information web portal, Climate.gov, and is a co-chair of the U.S. Global Change Research Program's Education Interagency Working Group. In addition, he has served as the U.S. Climate Action Report Education, Training, and Outreach chapter lead for the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), an education and youth delegate for the United States at the 2015 Conference of Parties (COP21), and a member of the Federal Steering Committee for the Fourth National Climate Assessment (NCA4).
At NOAA, he develops and implements NOAA's climate goal education and outreach efforts that specifically relate to NOAA's climate goal and literacy objective. Additionally, he is the managing lead of the U.S. Global Change Research Program document, "Climate Literacy: The Essential Principles of Climate Science."
Michael Kozuch, MIT's Climate Action Through Education (CATE) Lead Curriculum Developer on Social Sciences
Michael Kozuch (He/Him) has been a community activist, educator and organizer for educational equity, social justice and sustainability for more than 30 years. He started his career working for LGBT civil rights and has grown into seeing the interconnectedness among all social justice issues. He is a graduate of Northeastern University, BS ’93 and Harvard University, M. Ed. ’98 and has worked for the Massachusetts Department of Education, the Massachusetts Teachers Association and the Newton Public Schools. He is currently the K12 Director of History and Social Studies for the Arlington Public Schools and a curriculum developer for MIT's Climate Action Through Education (CATE) project. In addition, he is president of Earth Day Boston. Much of his education work is drawn from his experience working as a research participant with Harvard’s Project Zero, where he helped to develop models for interdisciplinary teaching and learning. He has been a guest lecturer at Boston College, the International Baccalaureate Asia Pacific Conference, and Harvard’s Project Zero Classroom. Michael is a world traveler, participating in a four-month exchange in Beijing, China, as well as shorter programs in South Korea, Indonesia, Mexico, Costa Rica, Panama, Morocco, Ecuador, Iceland and the Czech Republic.
This webinar is brought to you by ee360+.
ee360+: Building a Stronger and More Inclusive Movement Through Collective Impact
An ambitious multi-year initiative, the ee360+ Leadership and Training Collaborative connects, trains, and promotes innovative leaders dedicated to using the power of education to create a more just and sustainable future for everyone, everywhere. Led by NAAEE, ee360+ is made possible through funding and support from U.S. EPA and twenty-seven partner organizations representing universities and nonprofits across the country, and five federal agencies. Through this partnership, ee360+ brings together more than five decades of expertise to grow, strengthen, and diversify the environmental education field. Visit https://naaee.org/programs/ee360 to learn more.
