Where Does Climate Change Education Belong?

Climate change education is increasingly recognized as an important part of preparing young people for a changing world. Yet several fundamental questions remain surprisingly unsettled: where does climate change education belong in the curriculum? Is it primarily science, geography, social studies, environmental education or disaster risk reduction? Should it be integrated across several subject areas? And when should it begin — at the primary, secondary or tertiary level?

These are more than curriculum-design questions. How we answer them can influence whether climate change education (CCE) is meaningfully taught at all and, ultimately, what knowledge and capabilities our education systems develop for the future.

Research examining teachers’ experiences with climate change education suggests an important gap between recognizing its importance and feeling prepared to teach it. Plutzer et al. (2016), for example, identified significant challenges surrounding climate change instruction among U.S. science teachers, including limitations in teachers’ knowledge of climate science. Research by Clayton, Sangalang and Anderson similarly points to the importance of teacher knowledge, perceptions and experiences in shaping climate change education. Although these studies were conducted in the United States, they raise questions that deserve serious consideration in Small Island Developing States (SIDS), particularly in the Caribbean.

The Curriculum Placement Problem

One of the challenges surrounding climate change education is that there is not always a clear understanding of what it encompasses. Climate change can easily be reduced to a relatively narrow scientific discussion: greenhouse gases, global temperatures, sea-level rise and changing weather patterns. These concepts are important, but climate change has implications far beyond climate science.

For students living in Caribbean SIDS, climate change intersects with food security, water security, public health, livelihoods, tourism, infrastructure, disaster risk, coastal communities, migration, economic development and community resilience. It also intersects with the decisions students will eventually make as workers, professionals, entrepreneurs, community members and leaders.

If climate change education is positioned primarily within science, are students receiving the breadth of knowledge necessary to understand how climate change will affect their societies? The question is not simply where should climate change education be placed in the curriculum? We should also ask: where does climate change intersect with what students are already learning?

Recent work from Jamaica provides an interesting example of this shift. Ferguson and George (2026) explore opportunities for infusing Education for Sustainable Development into the primary-level mathematics curriculum. Their work challenges the assumption that sustainability and climate-related learning must be confined to subjects such as science and geography. Mijts (2025) offers another useful island-focused perspective, emphasizing interdisciplinary approaches grounded in the realities of island societies rather than relying solely on generic sustainability curricula — a perspective particularly relevant to Caribbean SIDS, where climate resilience, local knowledge and island identity can help shape how climate education is understood and delivered.

Once we begin thinking this way, considerably more possibilities emerge:

Geography can explore changing coastlines, land use and population vulnerability.
Social studies can examine climate policy, governance, inequality and community decision-making.
Economics and business education can explore climate-related industries, adaptation investment and emerging employment opportunities.
Agricultural education can examine food security and climate-smart agriculture.
Health education can address heat, vector-borne diseases and other climate-related health risks.
Psychology and related areas can help students understand how people respond to disruptive and traumatic events while introducing concepts such as empathy, psychosocial support and psychological first aid.
Technical and vocational education can introduce students to practical skills and emerging careers in renewable energy, resilient construction, water management and other areas of the green and blue economies.
Disaster preparedness education can help students understand how climate-related hazards translate into risks for households, schools and communities and, importantly, what people can do to reduce those risks.

What Capabilities Are We Actually Developing?

If climate-related knowledge and skills develop primarily within separate disciplines, education systems can unintentionally produce an uneven distribution of capabilities. We may develop people who can monitor and forecast a storm, for example, without developing enough people who understand how to support individuals and communities coping with its aftermath. Similarly, we can have professionals capable of identifying communities at significant risk of flooding without sufficient technical and community-level capacity to implement the measures necessary to reduce that risk.

Understanding risk is not the same as having the capacity to reduce it.

Climate change education should therefore do more than increase climate literacy. It should encourage education systems to consider the full range of knowledge, skills and competencies their societies will need to anticipate, prepare for, respond to and adapt to climate-related challenges.

For Caribbean SIDS, this is particularly important. Climate education cannot be separated entirely from questions of workforce development, disaster preparedness, adaptation capacity and national resilience. What students encounter in classrooms today can influence the professions they pursue, the skills available within their countries and, ultimately, the capacity of those countries to respond to future challenges.

Seen this way, climate change education does not necessarily need to compete for a single place in an already crowded curriculum. It may work better as a cross-curricular educational priority, deliberately connected to the capabilities Caribbean societies need to build resilience.

Curriculum Integration Requires Teacher Capacity

There is, however, a critical condition: changing curriculum documents alone will not solve the problem. Teachers are the people who translate curriculum into learning. If educators are uncertain about climate change, uncomfortable discussing it, unsure how it connects with their subject or lack the resources to teach it effectively, even a well-designed curriculum may have limited impact.

Research on climate change education in higher education also highlights the value of interdisciplinary approaches, innovative teaching methods and stronger institutional support (Leal Filho et al., 2026). Although that work focuses on universities, it reinforces a broader lesson relevant to education reform: curriculum integration requires institutions and educators to have the capacity to support it.

We cannot simply tell educators to “teach climate change” and assume they have been adequately prepared to do so. Teachers need opportunities to develop climate knowledge, explore practical teaching strategies, understand how climate issues intersect with their existing subjects and learn from other educators.

For Caribbean SIDS, this represents an opportunity to connect climate change education more deliberately with existing regional efforts around school safety, disaster risk reduction and resilience. The Caribbean Safe School Initiative provides an important foundation for strengthening safety and resilience within education systems. Building upon efforts of this kind with dedicated professional development in climate change and resilience education could help educators move beyond awareness toward practical classroom implementation.

Teacher Training Should Be Experiential

There is also a question of how this professional development should be delivered. Virtual learning has an important role to play, particularly across geographically dispersed island states. CDEMA, with support from UNICEF, developed the self-paced Safe Schools: Disaster Risk Reduction and Resilience online course through the CDEMA Regional Training Centre, providing education professionals with foundational knowledge and tools to support safe, resilient and disaster-ready learning environments across the Caribbean (UNICEF ECA & CDEMA, 2026).

The next phase of this regional work is particularly instructive. A 2026 UNICEF-CDEMA Terms of Reference calls for the development of a competency-based face-to-face Safe Schools Teacher Training Package designed to complement the existing online course — intended to move participants further toward applying concepts, developing practical competencies, learning collaboratively and translating training into school-level action (UNICEF ECA & CDEMA, 2026). This distinction matters because the initiative is focused on Comprehensive School Safety, Disaster Risk Reduction in Education and Education in Emergencies rather than climate change education specifically. However, it provides a useful regional model for thinking about professional development in climate and resilience education.

Knowledge transfer alone is not enough. Professional development should give educators opportunities to work through scenarios, examine local hazards, develop lesson ideas, experiment with activities, discuss misconceptions and determine how climate and resilience concepts can be incorporated into the subjects they already teach.

Just as importantly, teachers can learn from one another. A science teacher, for example, may approach climate change very differently from a geography teacher, primary school teacher, guidance counsellor or technical education instructor. Bringing those perspectives together can foster the interdisciplinary thinking that climate change education itself requires. In-person workshops can provide collaborative space for this exchange and hands-on learning.

Rather than viewing virtual and face-to-face professional development as competing approaches, a blended capacity-building model may be particularly useful. Virtual learning can provide foundational knowledge, wider regional access and continuing resources, while face-to-face learning can emphasize practical application, competency development, collaboration and locally relevant action planning.

Professional Development Should Also Be Recognized

If education systems want teachers and education leaders to develop additional competencies, those competencies should be recognized and supported. Wilmot’s (2026) work on school crisis planning in the Caribbean provides a useful perspective here, focusing on capacity development among mid-system education leaders involved in school crisis planning and reinforcing the importance of developing professional capacity for preparedness and continuity within education systems.

Recent regional developments point in a similar direction. The UNICEF-CDEMA Terms of Reference also asks the resulting programme to consider how the training could be delivered nationally, formally recognized, embedded within education systems and sustained over time, and calls for facilitators to be prepared to support delivery at the national level across participating states (UNICEF ECA & CDEMA, 2026).

Certificate-based professional development in climate change and resilience education is therefore one option worth considering. Such programs could provide educators with a tangible credential while helping education systems establish more consistent expectations around climate knowledge, resilience competencies and instructional capacity. Certification does not have to mean creating another burdensome requirement for teachers or non-teaching staff. Done properly, it could recognize professional growth while developing a network of educators capable of supporting climate and resilience education within their schools — some eventually becoming school-level champions, mentors or trainers who help build capacity among their colleagues.

That begins to move climate and resilience education from an isolated classroom activity toward institutional capacity.

Climate Education Is Also Workforce Development

The consequences of weak climate change education extend beyond whether students can correctly explain the greenhouse effect. Every student who leaves school without understanding the climate challenges affecting their country may also leave without recognizing the opportunities emerging in response to those challenges.

A student may never discover an interest in renewable energy. Another may never learn about the importance of occupations such as a rodman and the role such work plays in surveying, construction and infrastructure development. Yet another may never consider coastal engineering or resilient construction. Others may not recognize opportunities in climate finance, disaster risk management, sustainable tourism, resilient agriculture, environmental law, meteorology, water management, conservation or psychosocial support.

Climate education therefore has implications not only for environmental awareness but also for workforce development, economic resilience and national adaptation capacity. This does not mean every student needs to become a climate scientist, engineer or disaster management professional. It means students should have opportunities to see how their interests, talents and future professions intersect with the climate challenges facing their societies.

This is also where Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) becomes particularly relevant. TVET emphasizes practical and technical knowledge and skills connected to occupations and employment. The ECLAC Caribbean Regional Synthesis Report on the SAMOA Pathway situates education, institutional capacity and skills development within the broader sustainable-development priorities facing Caribbean SIDS and discusses regional work related to TVET and skills-development policies (Walker & Clauzel, 2023) — an important policy context for thinking about climate education not only as an environmental issue, but as part of preparing Caribbean workforces for changing economic, technological and environmental realities.

For Caribbean SIDS, that distinction matters. The region does not simply need populations that understand climate change. It needs people who can respond to it, adapt to it and help build the institutions, businesses, infrastructure and communities required for an increasingly uncertain future.

From Climate Education to Resilience Education

Ultimately, this is why the conversation should extend beyond climate change education alone. Knowing about climate change is important, but knowledge does not automatically produce resilience. Consider:

Students can understand why hurricanes may become more destructive without knowing how a household should prepare.
Students can understand why flooding occurs without possessing the practical skills needed to contribute to reducing flood risk.
Students can understand that disasters affect mental health without knowing how to recognize distress, demonstrate empathy or provide appropriate basic support.

There is a difference between knowing about a problem and developing the capacity to respond to it. Students therefore need opportunities to develop problem-solving, risk awareness, collaboration, adaptation, preparedness, decision-making and community engagement alongside climate knowledge.

Climate change education can become one component of a broader approach to resilience education: education that prepares young people not merely to understand the risks around them, but to participate in addressing them. Keswick et al. (2025) provide a useful contribution to this discussion through their examination of COPE Disaster Champions, a transdisciplinary and child-centred disaster risk reduction education initiative illustrating how storytelling, science and other forms of learning can engage children more actively in disaster risk reduction rather than positioning them solely as recipients of hazard information.

That distinction is important. Resilience education should not position children simply as passive recipients of risk information. It can create age-appropriate opportunities for them to develop preparedness, problem-solving, confidence and the capacity to participate in building resilience within their schools, households and communities.

This also changes the way we think about schools. They are not simply places where information about climate change can be transmitted. They are places where future community capabilities can begin to develop. For Caribbean Small Island Developing States, where climate impacts are not distant or theoretical, that may be one of the most important educational shifts we can make.

The first step is not simply adding more climate content to the curriculum. It is asking a broader set of questions: What should students understand about climate change? What should they be able to do with that knowledge? What capabilities will our societies need in the decades ahead? Have we adequately prepared teachers to help students develop them?

Before asking teachers to prepare the next generation for a changing climate, we must make sure we have prepared teachers to lead that learning.

References

Clayton, S., Sangalang, A., & Anderson, R. (2024). Emotions and perceptions surrounding teaching climate change in the United States: Results from a teacher survey. Environmental Education Research. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2023.2286934

Ferguson, T., & George, L. (2026). Exploring opportunities for the infusion of Education for Sustainable Development into the primary-level mathematics curriculum in Jamaica. Environmental Education Research. https://doi.org/10.1080/13504622.2025.2545540

Keswick, M., Sim, T., Suarez, L., Echeverri, D., Mather, T. A., & Pyle, D. M. (2025). From storytelling to resilience: A transdisciplinary approach to empowering children in disaster risk reduction. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 131, 105881. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ijdrr.2025.105881

Leal Filho, W., Sow, B. L., Perlin, A. P., Mbah, M. F., Amaro da Costa, C., Azam, F. M. S., & Dinis, M. A. P. (2026). Addressing climate change education: Relevant contributions from universities. International Journal of Sustainability in Higher Education, 27(1), 94–113. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSHE-11-2023-0542

Mijts, E. (2025). Turning the tide: Island imaginaries and interdisciplinaries in climate change. University of Aruba Repository.

Plutzer, E., McCaffrey, M., Hannah, A. L., Rosenau, J., Berbeco, M., & Reid, A. H. (2016). Climate confusion among U.S. teachers. Science, 351, 664–665. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aab3907

UNICEF Eastern Caribbean Area Office & Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency. (2026). Terms of reference: International consultant to develop, pilot and finalize a competency-based safe and inclusive schools teacher training package for the Eastern Caribbean.

Walker, L., & Clauzel, S. (2023). Progress in implementation of the Samoa Pathway: Caribbean regional synthesis report. Studies and Perspectives Series—ECLAC Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean, No. 121. Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Wilmot, A.-M. (2026). Building capacity for school crisis planning: Towards a professional development model for Caribbean mid-system education leaders. Comparative and International Education / Éducation Comparée et Internationale.