Monash University professors argue Australia’s education system must be overhauled to address climate adaptation in every course
Australia’s education system must be ‘realigned’ in response to the government’s latest doomsday climate risk assessment forecasts, two senior academics have argued.
The current Australian Curriculum pays more attention to climate change than its previous iteration, with 32 references to climate change across diverse subjects, but education at all levels needs to further realign to climate adaptation.
Climate adaptation should be part of the basic teaching syllabus of every course, as well as separate courses to improve general understanding at all levels.
Climate adaptation will affect every career, as the newly released National Climate Risk Assessment highlights.
The Assessment provides a comprehensive understanding of current and future climate risks across Australia.
It shows that every system will be impacted by climate change – from the environment to national security and finance.
Report’s alarming forecasts
Key findings include an increase in extreme, compounding hazard events with cascading consequences.
Sea level rise and extreme heat, for example, are emerging as widespread accelerating systemic risks.
Economic systems are being eroded by climate-related pressures (e.g. increasing insurance premiums in flood and fire-prone areas).
For example, with rising sea levels, 85 per cent of locations can expect centennial extremes to occur 30 days each year.
“Once in a century” events will become “once in a fortnight”.
The impacts are already being felt in many different disciplines.
Impact on work
For example, some of the top legal minds in the world are currently grappling with complex international issues such as if/when a country loses its exclusive economic zone because an island once populated by people has become so submerged that it is uninhabitable.
An engineer will not just go to the standard tables for building a railway line; they will need to look at future projections and plan their infrastructure to withstand additional heat, drought, flood and fire in the area of the build.
They will need to ensure that railway tracks will not buckle in only a decade’s time, or have ballast washed away.
Medicine will need to advance rapidly to combat the spread of new pathogens and diseases.
Financiers will need to be acutely aware of finite life investments and society sentiment to avoid stranded assets – climate risk will be just another standard business risk.
Politicians will face immense governance challenges as populations are displaced and voluntarily move.
Social sciences play a role here, too, in terms of future behavioural and social change, among others.
Students do not need to be working towards or in a job with “climate” in the title to develop an understanding about coming changes.
A trucking logistics person will for instance, need to understand areas at risk of supply chain interruptions from extreme weather. Managing electricity networks, outdoor festival management, financial planning, First Nations support, architecture, community planning, farm management, physical and mental health will require innovative minds with the skills to respond.
But in workshops run at university-level about future innovation, we encounter a misconception that many students believe their careers are unrelated to climate adaptation as they are not ‘green’ careers; hence, climate adaptation is not perceived in students’ career path even if they want to be part of the solution.
University students have told us that general teaching of climate change is unavailable to all students.
Many instead source information outside university, such as from social media.
The Assessment makes clear the need to support continuous climate adaptation, with responses the responsibility of everyone, including every teacher, every lecturer and every student in every school and education institution.
Educational tracks to the future must not be allowed to buckle or have ballast washed away.
The Assessment shows that there will be nothing and no one immune to future changes in our climate.
Young students demanding action
Young people aged 14-19 rank climate change and the environment in their top five issues, second only to cost-of-living.
Over half (52 per cent) of young people aged 18-24 say climate change needs immediate action.
Many are already experiencing the effects.
Analysis of a survey of Australians aged 15-19 by Orygen and Mission Australia found 13 per cent had been directly impacted by extreme weather events during the previous year, including displacement of communities, disruptions to housing, schooling, livelihood, access to essentials and “profound” psychological distress and social exclusion.
The Alice Springs (Mparntwe) Education Declaration, which outlines the goals for Australian schooling, states that the education system “must also prepare young people to thrive in a time of … complex environmental, social and economic challenges.”
Ensuring that the school curriculum better reflects the need for climate adaptation is a vital first step.
Dr Lucas Walsh is Professor of Education Policy and Practice at Monash University.
Dr Andrew Watkins is a co-ordinating lead author of the National Climate Risk Assessment, and a climate scientist at Monash University
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Originally published as Monash University professors argue Australia’s education system must be overhauled to address climate adaptation in every course
