Young Citizens for Change: developing environmental activism in young people through creative citizen inquiry

Project Description

ERASMUS Strategic Partnerships for Creativity: Youth
Project summary

Title:

Young Citizens for Change: developing environmental activism in young people through creative citizen inquiry

Project summary:
The majority of young people feel their generation is under pressure to solve environmental issues such as climate change and plastic pollution but do not think they are well-enough equipped to make a difference (Young, 2019).
Similarly, The UKSN/OXFAM (2019) report identified that:
• 75% of teachers feel they haven’t received adequate training to educate students about climate change
• 69% of teachers think there should be more teaching about climate change in UK schools
• 68% of pupils want to learn more about the environment and climate change

So, how can we provide an education that ensures that both teachers/youth workers and young people are learning about environmental issues and concerns in a way that empowers them to work towards providing active solutions to some of the problems leading to climate change, extinction of natural species and dwindling of the earth’s natural resources?
This project moves towards resolving this issue through placing young people at the forefront of identifying, researching and developing collaborative approaches to teaching and learning resource deficits through the co-creation of a needs-led, environmentally focused creative citizen inquiry response.
Young people will work together with trained citizen inquiry facilitators (teachers. youth workers etc.) to carry out a citizen inquiry in each of the partner countries which focuses on an area of environmental concern specific to their country. It is envisaged that the citizen inquiry will employ young people as researchers to explore their local history, topography and demography to identify any areas of environmental concern. This information will then be used to devise creative responses to tackling these concerns primarily through the use of digital technology to create educational resources to inspire, motivate and enthuse other children and young people.


Context/background of project

In the UK, research indicates a lack of concern about the environment is particularly prevalent among 14-24 year olds, who report feelings of disengagement and inaction, particularly in relation to climate change (Hiberd & Nguyen, 2013). One suggested reason for this is that young people still view climate change as primarily affecting ‘far away’ places (British Science Association, 2013) reflecting a consistent trend among people of all ages toward psychological distancing (Spence et al., 2010). This correlates with the finding that there are significant discrepancies in the level of understanding of young people and climate change in different nations. Therefore, building a richer understanding of international youth perspectives on climate change is an important priority for this project, specifically, to compare and evaluate the sorts of messages, languages and narratives about environmental concerns that are resonating with young people from different countries.
Another area which this project will focus on, in which there is currently very limited research is on the role of social media and the use of digital technology in activating young people’s climate change engagement (Alexander, 2013). This project will involve young people in the identification, testing, creation and development of a range of creative digital technologies to make youth engagement with the environment more effective and inspiring, and to encourage the wider dissemination and sharing of their citizen inquiry findings amongst a wider range of children and young people.

Objectives of your project

• To work across the partnership to develop interdisciplinary creative citizen inquiry methodologies
• To harness the collective intelligence of young people across Europe toward creating creative digital education resources around various environmental issues.
• To understand their own local environmental issues, i.e. flooding or water shortage and also those facing partner schools
• To equip teachers, educators and youth workers with the skills and knowledge to utilise citizen inquiry pedagogy effectively.


Description of activities

The use of citizen inquiry as the primary methodology within this project will place young people at the forefront of the research process, through the planning, design and execution of genuine youth-led inquiries which will aim to lead to the identification of sustainable initiatives and ways forward for engaging other young people in the specific environmental concerns related to their locality.
Young people will utilise the knowledge gained though citizen inquiry to develop, launch and evaluate digital education resources aimed at educating other children and young people about an area of localised environmental concern.
Cohorts of young people from each partner country will liaise digitally and physically (Covid-19 restrictions pending) to collaborate on the creation of resources. It is intended that this international so-creation approach will be facilitated through establishing a podcast/vlogging series to be hosted on Spotify/Soundcloud in which each of the project groups will create, coordinate and participate.

Methodology to be used in carrying out the project

Citizen Inquiry is a combination of citizen science and inquiry-based learning. The term was created to describe ways through which members of the public can learn by initiating, joining or leading shared inquiry-led research investigations (Herodotou, 2017). Citizen inquiry fosters the move from research participants being passive recipients to becoming actively engaged in the research and the relationship between academia and research participants is more cooperative as a result.
It is our contention that participatory methodologies, such as citizen inquiry, are more likely to engage young people in issues such as the climate change agenda because they involve participants directly in the process of identifying and responding to issues that concern them.
We have already pioneered the use of creative citizen inquiry methodologies with young people in several previous projects (see Burden et al., 2020) and this experience, combined with our innovative use of digital technologies (our current research (Burden et al. 2020) has demonstrated how digital technologies, e.g. mobile phones, apps, e-Books, digital cameras, social media, are particularly effective for motivating and engaging young people in societal challenges) position us ideally to drive forward the position of citizen inquiry as an effective research method for mobilising genuine youth-led inquiry based research across Europe.


Short description of the results and impact envisaged and potential longer term benefits.

At the completion of our project, we will have produced the tangible results from four distinct creative citizen inquiry initiatives. These will be jointly developed by all partners and focus on developing a set of creative responses to localised environmental concerns through young people’s engagement with local residents, community groups and environmental organisations/initiatives.
Creative responses will be fostered through exploring a wider understanding of global issues, leading to the collaborative creation of digital resources such as podcasts; vlogs; mobile apps; digital games; animations and eBooks. We will assemble these youth-generated resources with accompanying session plans which will be tested with teachers/youth workers etc. through each of the project partnerships.
We will run Multiplier Events in each project country plus a final Multiplier Event which disseminates the work of the project to an international audience. The processes and outcomes will be carefully evaluated and this plus other data will feed at least two research papers (IO6) plus conference presentations and poster sessions. All of this activity is described in more detail in the appropriate section. In terms of individual actors in the project:

Results for partner institutions:

• Creation of links with local community/residents, environmental and creative organisations
• Development of new interdisciplinary youth-led citizen inquiry methodologies that support the curriculum but also motivate pupils through contacts with environmental experts and through creative approaches to digital technologies.
• New in-service and/or pre-service teacher training programmes, tested with both national and international audiences. Also applicable to informal educators i.e. youth workers.
• Academic links with researchers and teacher educators across and outside of the partnership with the potential for new projects and/or additional research

Results for young people:

• Development of the practical skills required for facilitating creative citizen inquiry including formulating research questions, development and testing of hypotheses, digital competence and data analysis alongside creativity and critical thinking skills (especially in relation to environmental problem solving)
• Development of ‘soft skills’ including communication and interpersonal skills appropriate for dialogues with their peer group and with local community, environmental and creative organisations.
• A new understanding their own local environmental issues, and those facing partner schools and the ability to relate these to appropriate policy directives i.e. Sustainable Development Goals


References:
Burden, K., Dean, C., James, F. & Wurzel, R. (2020) Engaging Young People in the Circular Plastics Economy using Citizen Inquiry Methodologies and Creative Participatory Research Methods Creative Circular Economy Approaches to Eliminate Plastic Waste. Available at: https://www.ukcpn.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/PRIF-Conference-Brochure-Final-1.pdf
Young, S. (2019) World Environment Day: 80% of teens feel under pressure to save the planet but aren’t learning how. Accessed online on 02/10/20 at https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/teenagers-save-planet-world-environment-day-2019-climate-change-plastic-pollution-protest-a8945131.html
UKSCN / Oxfam teachers survey (350 responses, primary and secondary, UK wide, May 2019)