Project Name: Pacific Islands Climate Education Partnership (PCEP)
Location: Pacific Islands region
Who We Are: The Pacific Islands Climate Education Partnership (PCEP) is a collaborative network of Pacific Island communities and organizations responding to the impacts of climate change and committed to improving climate education in the Pacific Island region. The United States Affiliated Pacific Island (USAPI) region includes Hawai‘i, American Samoa, Guam, the Commonwealth of the Northern Marianna Islands (CNMI), the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), the Republic of Palau, and the Federated States of Micronesia (FSM).
Mission: PCEP aims to empower the region’s students and citizens through education that exemplifies modern science and indigenous environmental knowledge, addresses the urgency of climate change impacts, and honors indigenous cultures so that students and citizens within the region will have the knowledge and skills to improve understandings of climate change and how to adapt to its impacts. The current and projected climate impacts that these islands face can cause great harm to the ecosystems and physical infrastructures that are vital to USAPI citizens, especially the indigenous populations.
What We Do:
- Implement a next-generation Climate Education Framework that focuses on the content and skills necessary for understanding global and Pacific Island climates, and local adaptation to these climate impacts
- Gather local indigenous knowledges based on stories and traditional practices related to environmental stewardship, climate, and local adaptation strategies
- Enhance conditions for learning about climate through college-level climate education programs; professional learning opportunities for teachers; and increased teacher implementation of relevant climate curricula
- Connect schools and community partners through projects aligned with the CEF to implement effective and sustainable climate education
Audience: Teachers, University Faculty, Informal Educators
Whom to Contact: Corrin Barros, Project Manager, barrosc@prel.org
PI: Marylin Low, PREL, lowm@prel.org
Co-PIs: Art Sussman, WestEd, asussma@wested.org, Charles Fletcher, University of Hawaii, fletcher@soest.hawaii.edu, Don Hess, College of the Marshall Islands, cmihess@gmail.com, Sharon Nelson-Barber, WestEd, snelson@wested.org