The Climate Change Education Workshop was run successfully in partnership with UNESCO, Institution of Engineers Mauritius, a WFEO national member, the Office for Climate Education, a UNESCO Category II Centre based in Paris, the Mauritius Ministry of Education, Tertiary Education, Science and Technology, the Mauritius National Commission to UNESCO and Mauritius Institute of Education (MIE) that has provided the venue for the workshops.
Climate Change Workshop Participants, Mauritius 24 November 2022
The project was funded by the National Environment Agency Singapore (NEA) that donated the prize money from the WFEO Innovation Prize (2019) to support the project.
The objective of the Climate Change Education Workshop was curriculum development and teacher training for world class climate change education for primary and secondary schools in Mauritius.
Planning commenced in September 2019 but in-person delivery was delayed due to COVID. The project took three years to deliver and remained focused as a result of the passion and dedication of all the representatives of the partners that were involved. The project was initiated and led by WFEO Past President Dr Marlene Kanga.
Mauritius Minister for Education, Tertiary Education, Science and Technology opens the Climate Change Education Workshop, Mauritius, 22 November 2022
The first session was delivered virtually on 29-30 June 2021. This was enthusiastically received by the teachers who attended.
The in person workshop was the second session and was held on 22-25 November 2022, at the Mauritius Institute of Education.
The project was strongly supported by the WFEO President Prof. Jose Vieira who delivered the following comments at the opening of the workshop: “WFEO has been continuously advocating in favor of training more engineers, technicians, educators so they can have the right skills to be up to the task of fighting, mitigating and adapting to climate change, especially in countries which face the most consequences of it. Training the educators, and mentoring the engineering education national system, in order to bring harmonization in standards, are the main pillars of this strategy, and this workshop sets a perfect example of its implementation.”
The Office for Climate Education (OCE) provided expert facilitators led by Dr David Wilgenbus, Executive Director and Dr Simon Klein, Science Officer. Training materials were shipped from Paris to Mauritius for the teachers who attended. The workshop also included a Hands-On Learning session at the beach, using the UNESCO SANDWATCH Teaching Tools that have been developed specifically for the Small Island Developing States.
Dr David Wilgenbus addresses participants at the workshop in Mauritius, 22 November 2022
Our thanks to UNESCO for their support in Paris and Mauritius, the Institution of Engineers Mauritius who provided the key contacts in Mauritius to the government agencies to make the workshop a reality and the Office for Climate Education for their expertise and contribution to running the workshop and providing the training materials.
The significant outcome of the training project was training for primary and secondary school teachers, from Mauritius and Rodrigues and training for Teacher Trainers. The attended also developed curricula for ongoing teaching of climate change – causes and effects, with long term benefits for the people of Mauritius.
Dr Simon Klein, OCE (RHS), in an interactive workshop with participants, Mauritius, 23 November 2022
The Program Book for the hands in workshop is available here.
The WFEO Report on the project is available here.
The OCE Report on the outcomes is available here.
With the donation of the 2022 WFEO Innovation prize to support similar projects, there are plans to continue to collaborate with OCE to deliver similar projects in other Small Island Developing States.
Article Contributed by Dr Marlene Kanga, WFEO President 2017-2019, April 2023
For more information:
WFEO and Small Island Developing States (SIDS)
APR
2023