Communitopia wraps up an incredible year of climate change education!
Written by Katie Modic
The work of Communitopia — empowering everyone to participate in locally-focused, community-based solutions to climate change — has looked more different this year than anyone might have imagined.
While COVID-19 disrupted our flow, it’s been a time of tremendous innovation, collaboration and reimagining the scope and scale of our impact.
Despite the disruption, our students, teachers, and stakeholders dove in deeper, navigating at-home learning alongside our dedicated staff with tenacity. While the pandemic rages on, Communitopia has been busy collaborating with partners throughout the region and nation to foster and spread inspiring grassroots activism.
Here are just a few recent milestones and events we’re encouraged by as we look ahead to the future of increasing climate literacy and engagement in solutions regionally:
Climate Change Champions Workshops
Our Climate Change Champions Workshops, which we provide for free to middle and high school classrooms in environmental justice communities, increase students' scientific literacy and their motivation to take action on climate change. Despite the pandemic, we've taught our workshops to a total of 368 students in 2020, 208 being taught virtually. With the help of teachers, we've documented a total of 63 student actions taken post workshop! This workshop series was awarded the PA Governor's Award for Environmental Excellence in October, 2020.
Don't Just Sit There, Do Something
Our Don't Just Sit There, Do Something Videos, a series of short videos on climate science drenched in news and humor plus immediate actions viewers can take, topped a total of 1 million views on YouTube this year!
Woodland Hills Youth Climate Action Summit
With the support of Green Building Alliance, Women for a Healthy Environment, and the Wild Center, Communitopia supported the incredible Woodland Hills Climate Action Team in hosting the region's first Youth Climate Action Summit in October, 2020. Hundreds of youth from around the region tuned in to engage in locally-focused, youth-led climate action!
Climate Change Teacher Fellowships
Communitiopia launched the Climate Change Teacher Fellowship program in October 2020. Participating educators will be coached through creating a Climate Change Solutionary unit of study. The goal is to help students become solutionary in their thinking and use their campus as a laboratory for implementing scalable climate solutions. The current cohort is designing units around climate-friendly food, energy efficiency, and waste management.
Growing Family
Finally, Communitopia received an unprecedented amount of support in 2020 from individual donors, local foundations, amazing volunteers, and partnering organizations. We simply couldn't realize our goals without your support! If you're reading this, you care about this work and the health of your neighbors, your community, and our home planet. Our gratitude runs deep!
