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School strike for climate: A reckoning for education

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  16 February 2022

Blanche Verlie Open the ORCID record for Blanche Verlie [Opens in a new window]  and
Alicia Flynn
Blanche Verlie*
Affiliation:
Sydney Environment Institute, The University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW, Australia
Alicia Flynn
Affiliation:
Melbourne Graduate School of Education, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Vic, Australia
*
*Corresponding author. E-mail: blanche.verlie@gmail.com
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Abstract

In this article framing the special issue on the global school strikes for climate, we ask: what if education is not the solution, but part of the system young people want to change? In conversation with school strikers and reflecting on the contributions to this issue, we argue that the strikes pose a reckoning for education. Five key themes emerge from this special issue: (1) students are striking because of the affective weight of climate injustice; (2) students learn through their participation in striking, in contrast to the often insufficient climate change education taught in schools; (3) young people are becoming climate change educators through their roles as strikers; (4) strikers are patronised through paternalistic structures (including schooling) that ostensibly exist to protect them; and therefore (5) we need to reimagine education. We then advance four propositions for education in response to young people’s modest demands for a liveable future: (1) young people are in and of the collapsing climate; (2) youth voices need to be taken seriously, without excusing adult and collective responsibilities; (3) multigenerational, more-than-human, intercultural collaborations must be practiced in education for climate justice; and (4) we must learn to navigate ontological uncertainty and attend to ethical complexity.

Keywords

activismclimate changeFridays for futureprotestSchool Strike 4 Climateyoung people
Type
Framing Article/Editorial
Information
Australian Journal of Environmental Education , Volume 38 , Special Issue 1: School Strike for Climate , March 2022 , pp. 1 - 12
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Copyright
© The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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