In this seminar where learned about how to approach climate anxiety and eco-emotions in the educational setting. During the seminar, we discussed practices, available resources, needs, and wishes.

The educational sector has a pivotal role to play in addressing the sustainability crises we are facing by, inter alia, providing students with knowledge, skills, and competence development. As educators, how can we share information about sustainability crises including climate change and discuss the seriousness of these crises, while also providing support to deal with the emotional responses that may arise? How can we support each other in this endeavour and reduce the risk of feeling overwhelmed, emotionally drained, or numb? 

Climate anxiety is a combination of feelings that someone can experience when having concerns about climate change and the state of the planet. Climate anxiety is sometimes used as a concept to capture different emotional responses to sustainability crises in general. In addition to anxiety, being confronted with any sustainability crisis can give rise to different emotional responses, including anger, fear, guilt, and sadness. While emotional responses can cause great suffering, they can also be a productive force and indicate issues of importance, crossed boundaries, unmet needs, or personal values, all of which can provide us a direction to work towards individually and collaboratively. 

Content and presenters

During the seminar, we: 

• Talked about emotional responses to sustainability crises including what climate anxiety is and how it differs from other types of anxiety.
• Learned about the latest research and practice within climate anxiety/eco-emotions including different approaches to deal with climate anxiety/eco-emotions.
• Discussed how to provide space for students to deal with their emotional responses and what support educators as well as the university can provide.
• Learned about available resources and discuss needs and wishes.

We invited two experts on eco-emotions – Panu P. Pihkala (University of Helsinki) and Marlis Wullenkord (Lund University) – to share their knowledge and experiences. In addition, three Lund University units that are dealing with climate anxiety/eco-emotions in different ways presented their work, experiences, and reflections – the Student Health Centre, the Occupational Health Service, and Medvetenskapens hus.

The seminar mixed presentations with discussions and more interactive parts.

Audience

This seminar was intended for programme directors, course coordinators, educators (at all levels including PhD students), and study administrators at Lund University. 

Organizers:

The seminar was organized by Lund University's Sustainability Forum in collaboration with the Division for Higher Education Development (AHU), and LTH Centre for Engineering Education (CEE).

Sustainability Forum - sustainability.lu.se

Division for Higher Education Development (AHU) - ahu.lu.se

LTH Centre for Engineering Education - lth.se

The relationship between supervisor and student is sacred – paving the way for a good outcome regarding time, effort, enjoyment, contribution, and learning for all involved. In this seminar, we explored various approaches to support your supervision of interdisciplinary theses.

In our changing world, researchers and students will want to address real-world problems from an interdisciplinary perspective, recognising the power and limitations of such an approach. Lund University is teaming with opportunities for interdisciplinary research and collaboration, for example, the new LU Profile Areas, Strategic Research Areas, as well as the LU Agenda 2030 Graduate School and Postdoc Excellence Programme. The new LU Strategy for Education highlights the importance of Education for Sustainability (EfS) and students are clamouring for the knowledge and skills to be able to tackle sustainability challenges beyond the classroom. Thus, we can expect more opportunities and more requests to supervise interdisciplinary theses. 

An interdisciplinary thesis is an independent student project, which integratesknowledge, methods, and insights from two or more disciplines to examine a complex, often real-world, problem, yielding a richer understanding than a single disciplinary perspective. Whether or not you have experience supervising student theses, there are various approaches that will enhance your interaction with a student embarking on an interdisciplinary thesis – mind mapping, systems thinking, methodological triangulation, concept saturation, Socratic questioning, among others. 

During the seminar, we discussed:

• Integrating disciplinary knowledge and methods
• Setting knowledge and project boundaries
• Dealing with complexity
• Fostering effective communication and collaboration techniques
• Implementing co-supervision or peer supervision

The workshop was hosted by the Division for Higher Education Development at Lund University. Moderated by Steven Curtis (Pedagogical Developer).

Audience

This seminar was intended for those who may supervise interdisciplinary Bachelor's or Master's degree projects or theses at Lund University, including programme directors, grading committees, and supervisors.

Organisers

The seminar was organised by the Division for Higher Education Development (AHU), the Sustainability Forum, and LTH Centre for Engineering Education (CEE), in partnership with the LU profile area Nature-Based Future Solutions. 

Division for Higher Education Development (AHU) - lu.se
Sustainability Forum - lu.se
LTH Centre for Engineering Education - lu.se
Nature-Based Future Solutions - lu.se

As educators, how can we prepare students to tackle the complexity of sustainability challenges while providing support to navigate the emotional toll that these problems and their impacts may elicit? The use of a serious game may be one such pedagogical approach to address both needs.

A serious game is any intervention or simulation that integrates educational content, skills development, and learning outcomes into a game-like environment that promotes student engagement, critical thinking, problem-solving, and collaboration. By combining game mechanics with pedagogical principles, serious games allow students to explore complex real-world issues, experience decision-making scenarios, and apply theoretical concepts in an interactive and inclusive learning environment.

In this interactive seminar we explored how serious games can be used as a pedagogical approach to advance student understanding of complex sustainability issues. 

During the seminar, we:

• Introduced serious games as a pedagogical approach
• Discussed the latest research and practice
• Considered any drawbacks or tradeoffs
• Shared known examples and experiences
• Explored the possible use of a serious game in our own learning environments
• Learned from others’ experiences at Lund University

In the seminar participants demoed the game Biodiversity Collage, as well as listened to presentations from practitioners and engaged in discussion with colleagues.

Learn more about the Biodiversity Collage – fresquedelabiodiversite.org

Audience

This seminar was intended for programme directors, course coordinators, educators, and study administrators at Lund University. 

About the Organisers

The seminar was organised as part of the emerging community at Lund University, called Teaching for Sustainability, for those educators wishing to receive support and inspiration to integrate sustainability into their curriculum.

The seminar was organised by the Division for Higher Education Development (AHU), the Sustainability Forum, and LTH Centre for Engineering Education (CEE), with support from Léa Lévy, Associate Senior Lecturer at Engineering Geology.

Division for Higher Education Development (AHU) - lu.se
Sustainability Forum - lu.se
LTH Centre for Engineering Education - lu.se