Learning for Sustainability Scotland at the 3rd International Seminar on Climate Change Education in Sicily organised by the Office for Climate Education and UNESCO
Our Learning for Sustainability Scotland Director, Beth Christie, and Development Manager, Cecilia Mañosa Nyblon, were honoured to join an esteemed global community of climate scientists, education experts and field practitioners at the 3rd International Seminar on Climate Change Education organised by the Office for Climate Education/UNESCO within the historic and inspiring setting of the Ettore Majorana Foundation and Center for Scientific Culture ets in Sicily, Italy from 17-23rd July 2025.
The Office for Climate Education, under the auspices of UNESCO, aims to ‘organise strong international cooperation between scientific bodies, NGOs and educational institutions to educate present and future generations about climate change, to equip them with the tools of understanding and action to protect them from preconceptions, ideologies or irrationality and to prepare them to live in a changing world.’
The seminar included presentations, hands-on workshops, and lively discussions exploring the opportunities and challenges of teaching and learning about climate change within the broader context of sustainability education. A key focus was on the importance of interdisciplinary approaches to ensure a holistic and integrated response to climate education.
The Office of Climate Education led a series of lectures and workshops addressing themes such as complexity, emotions, climate justice, active pedagogies, evaluation and assessment, and teacher education. These sessions were complemented by contributions from UNESCO, who provided updates on the Greening Education Partnership, the European Commission, which presented the GreenComp (European Sustainability Competency Framework), and the OECD/PISA, which shared progress toward including a metric on climate literacy beginning in 2029.
The seminar also offered a wonderful opportunity to share the policy architecture story of Learning for Sustainability in Scotland as well as LfS practice spanning areas of professional learning, assessment, creative pedagogies, policy and the power of cross-sectoral collaboration and interdisciplinary learning and teaching to co-create sustainable futures. True to the spirit of the seminar, this international gathering is sowing the seeds for a strong community of actors committed to collaborating, enlarging the space for dialogue, for the co-creation of new possibilities anchored in creativity, solidarity, and futures thinking connecting the Global South and the Global North.