Facing the climate crisis with critical hope: Preparing students for an uncertain future
No registration required. See you on Friday in Ponderosa Oak House 2012!
Synopsis:
Young people today are experiencing an overwhelming sense of eco-anxiety, climate grief, and a loss of hope as they grapple with the harsh realities of a changing planet. The latest IPCC report (2023) gave the world just a few years to limit warming to 1.5 degrees but current projections suggesting we are on track for at least 3 degrees of warming. In the United States federal funding for climate action has been decimated and critical climate education and research is being restricted, defunded, and censored by the Trump administration. Against this backdrop, educating students studying for environmental and sustainability fields has become both an academic and existential challenge. Until recently, I approached teaching about the climate crisis from the perspective of mitigation and adaptation. However, the gravity of the situation and sense of desperation from students demanded a shift in focus. It became clear that we need to prepare environmental and sustainability students for the reality we face – the need to focus on making the “climate landing” as soft as possible for as many people as possible, while ensuring we do so through a lens of equity and justice. In this talk, I will discuss the results of a semester-long student project on critical hope that I’ve implemented throughout my courses, based the work of Dr. Kari Grain. In this project students build essential coping skills, process complex emotions, engage in meaningful action, and learn strategies from decolonial, anti-racist, and intersectional movements. The projects have been transformational for students, pointing to the importance of interrogating how we teach about the climate crisis and the importance of cultivating a deep critical hope in students entering environmental and sustainability fields.
Bio:
Dr. Becky Williams is an Assistant Professor of Interdisciplinary Studies at Grand Valley State University in Allendale, Michigan. She teaches in the Environmental Studies; Global Studies; Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; and Integrative Studies programs. Her research focuses on the impacts of climate change on rural and indigenous livelihoods in Central America, and how it impacts livelihood pathways – particularly in terms of irregular migration to the United States or participation in violent livelihoods such as gangs and narcotrafficking. She also conducts research on gender and development projects (e.g., women’s empowerment initiatives, gender-based violence mitigation) through the lens of contemporary critical feminist critiques of development including intersectionality, masculinities, and decoloniality. Dr. Williams earned her PhD in Interdisciplinary Ecology, concentrating in Tropical Conservation and Development from the University of Florida and a graduate certificate in Gender and Development. She holds a MS in Instructional Systems Design from Florida State University and a BS in Music Education from Stetson University.
Congratulations to David Warkentin on successfully defending his EdD Dissertation
Please join us in congratulating David Warkentin who successfully defended his EdD Dissertation on March 10 of 2025.
Title:
Unsettling Education in Stó:Lō Téméxw: Exploring the Particularities of Place in Curriculum Research
Abstract:
The role of place in education is complex and multifaceted; place is both a topic of inquiry and a context for education. Yet many Western approaches to education continue to be structured around universal approaches to knowledge and skills development that neglect the role of place in education. The result is education operating under the illusion of placelessness, which obscures how Western society exerts power over people and land in the places of education.
This dissertation responds to the problem of placelessness by examining the author’s location as an educator in Stó:lō Téméxw, the land of the Stó:lō people, commonly known as British Columbia’s Fraser Valley. This project draws on the curriculum research method of synoptic text, a form of inquiry that explores relevant historical and cultural knowledge on topics in society and education. Synoptic text research is used to explore the historical impacts of possessiveness and superiority in settler colonialism in this region, providing relevant examples from the author’s own practice.
This research contributes to the field of place-based education by drawing on concepts from critical place-based and Indigenous land-based education to address the complexities of Indigenous and settler connection to the land. Connection to the land is surveyed within both Stó:lō and settler history. The wisdom of Stó:lō relationship and responsibility to the land is examined alongside the settler assumptions of possessiveness and superiority. By engaging the complicated conversations between Stó:lō and settler perspectives and practices, this curriculum research invites educators to refuse easy solutions to the complexity of decolonization in education.
The curriculum research findings lead to discussion on practices of unlearning and relationality that contribute to decolonization in education. Research conversations with Stó:lō educators and leaders and experiments with curriculum examples are included to illustrate ways the relevant knowledge of Stó:lō Téméxw can inform educational practice. The iterative and contextual nature of these conversations and curriculum examples invite educators to consider the implications for unsettling education in their own places of education.
Chair of Examination Committee:
Dr. Kerry Renwick
University Examiners:
Dr. Harpell Montgomery (School of Social Work)
Dr. Cash Ahenakew (Educational Studies)
External Examiner:
Dr. Geraldine Balzer (University of Saskatchewan)
Supervisory Committee:
Dr. Alison Taylor (Supervisor)
Dr. William Pinar (Member)
Dr. Joaquin Muñoz (Member)
Roman, Leslie
Retired faculty
Research interests: Children and youth, Cultural studies, Disability studies, Equity and Diversity, Feminist Theory, Gender Studies, Multiculturalism, Post-colonial studies, Sociology of Education
EDST Doctoral Colloquium – African History and the Decolonization of the Nigerian Secondary School History Curriculum
PCN 2012
Thursday March 6th, 12:30 – 2 pm
Oladipupo Ogunfeibo
The nationalists’ struggle for self-determination in the 1950s and 1960s in many British and French African colonies took on the scholarship in African history as one of its resistance strategies. In its diverse form (as a concept, discipline, socio-cultural and political project, field of study, and school curriculum), African history emerged largely to reject the Eurocentric construction that ‘Africa’ and ‘Africans’ had no history until its encounter with European colonizers. In dismissing the Eurocentric distortion of Africa and reclaiming and reaffirming African history through literature, arts, politics and education, scholars have drawn on diverse forms of postcolonial theories (Marxism, ecocritical theory, critical theory, feminism, historical and many others), which have also been influential in different attempts at decolonization.
However, particular conceptions and approaches to postcolonial and decolonial discourses in education have left unresolved and further entrenched patterns of colonialism. This dissertation looks at postcolonial attempts to decolonize and legitimize particular political discourses. Taking the Nigerian context as a case study, this study seeks to (1) problematize the postcolonial and decolonial construction of African history and (2) explore what particular ideals and practices associated with African history offer a more plausible approach to decolonization. Using archival methods in exploring policy documents, school curricula, textbooks and other publicly available documents, this study asks: (a) What does the scholarly debate about history education among the academic and professional organizations in Nigeria reveal about how the notion of African history is constructed? (b) What does a critical discourse analysis of the Nigerian secondary school history textbooks reveal about the meaning and representation of decolonization? (c) How does this approach to seeking decolonization impact Nigeria’s secondary school educational system?
UBC at Philosophy of Education Society 2025
We are proud to announce that UBC and, in particular, the Department of Educational Studies will be exceptionally well represented at the upcoming international conference of the Philosophy of Education Society (PES) and John Dewey Society (JDS) in Baltimore, MD (March 2025):
- Adi Burton, PhD graduate, ISGP, and Independent Scholar, “Tracing Hannah Arendt’s Impact on Educational Theory: A Philosophical Review,” PES work in progress; also respondent to Kyle Greenwalt, PES
- Thandi Fletcher, PhD student, EDST, “When Free Speech Hurts: Ethical Approaches to Controversial Speakers on University Campuses,” PES
- Addyson Frattura, PhD student, EDST, respondent to David Hansen, PES
- Silas Krabbe, PhD student, EDST, “Nonhuman as Pedagogue: Towards Conceptual Limits,” PES pre-conference; also respondent to Traver Scott Carlson, PES
- Jessica Lussier, PhD student, EDST, “Risking Response-Ability,” PES pre-conference
- Itamar Manoff, PhD graduate, EDST, and Sessional Lecturer, CENES, respondent to Krassimir Stojanov, PES
- Peter Nelson, Assistant Professor of Teaching, EDCP, “Examining Failure in Pedagogy and Baseball,” JDS
- Sam Rocha, Associate Professor, EDST, “The Poetic Secret of Objects and the Syllabus as Curriculum,” PES; also respondent to Deron Boyles, PES
- Claudia Ruitenberg, Professor, EDST, “The Educated Person and the Work of Repair,” Presidential Address, PES
- Anna Ryoo, PhD graduate, EDCP, Assistant Professor, California State University, Northbridge, “Tracing Hannah Arendt’s Impact on Educational Theory: A Philosophical Review,” PES work in progress
- Yuya Takeda, PhD graduate and Sessional Lecturer, LLED, “Negative Capability as a Component of Critical Literacy: Suspicion, Suspension, Sustenance,” PES work in progress; also respondent to Maxwell Anthony, PES
