Climate Justice Education Minor
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Program description
The climate emergency is the most pressing challenge of our time. Urgently needed adaptation and mitigation strategies require aligning all systems of our civilization with the ecological health of the planet. A transition guided by equity, diversity, and intersectional justice has long been the key demand of youth climate activists. In most educational practices, however, climate change education “focuses exclusively on scientific teaching, without cultivating the full breadth of competencies necessary to engage students in effective action” (UNESCO, 2021 p. 34). Addressing climate change requires engaging not only with climate science but with the cultural, ideological, psychological and other aspects of the planetary emergency. In poll after poll, the majority of young people identify climate change and inequality as inextricably linked (Cambridge International, 2020), and they demand intersectional climate justice.
Courses in the Climate Justice Education minor are designed around themes that develop four core capabilities students will need as global citizens in a climate-altered world: justice, imagination, hope, and responsibility. The courses bring together multiple disciplinary perspectives focalized through the lens of climate justice: a key framework today to engage the wider public in transformational change for planetary and human health. Committed to racial equity and inclusion, climate justice education engages with systemic, socioeconomic, and intergenerational inequalities engendered by climate change to envision not merely what one is against but what one is for: a habitable planet, a just transition, and an ecological civilization that works for everyone.
Specifically, the minor conveys a transdisciplinary curriculum grounded in educational frameworks—especially engagement with books, films, games, and other narrative formats for young audiences—empowers students to develop future thinking skills, civic capacities, and ecocentric values to ensure an ecological and just future. In addition to reading literature, students will apply their learning to community-engaged, public-facing projects that will serve as resources for growing climate literate communities.
Student learning outcomes (SLOs) for the minor, which will meet several of the University of Minnesota’s student learning outcomes, include:
An understanding of climate justice education and the tools it offers to address the racial, socioeconomic, ideological, and other drivers of the climate emergency.
An understanding of the need to extend justice, equity, and inclusion to all human and non-human communities.
An awareness of how values, attitudes, and beliefs impact the complex interrelationships across spheres of socioecological systems.
An appreciation of how education, imagination, and future thinking skills are necessary to ensure a transformation toward an ecological civilization.
An ability to recognize and navigate climate emotions, including in communication with stakeholders with different perspectives and priorities.
An ability to critically evaluate concepts, ideas, actions, and relations for their climate and planetary health consequences.
Courses in the Climate Justice Education minor are designed around themes that develop four core capabilities students will need as global citizens in a climate-altered world: justice, imagination, hope, and responsibility. The courses bring together multiple disciplinary perspectives focalized through the lens of climate justice: a key framework today to engage the wider public in transformational change for planetary and human health. Committed to racial equity and inclusion, climate justice education engages with systemic, socioeconomic, and intergenerational inequalities engendered by climate change to envision not merely what one is against but what one is for: a habitable planet, a just transition, and an ecological civilization that works for everyone.
Specifically, the minor conveys a transdisciplinary curriculum grounded in educational frameworks—especially engagement with books, films, games, and other narrative formats for young audiences—empowers students to develop future thinking skills, civic capacities, and ecocentric values to ensure an ecological and just future. In addition to reading literature, students will apply their learning to community-engaged, public-facing projects that will serve as resources for growing climate literate communities.
Student learning outcomes (SLOs) for the minor, which will meet several of the University of Minnesota’s student learning outcomes, include:
An understanding of climate justice education and the tools it offers to address the racial, socioeconomic, ideological, and other drivers of the climate emergency.
An understanding of the need to extend justice, equity, and inclusion to all human and non-human communities.
An awareness of how values, attitudes, and beliefs impact the complex interrelationships across spheres of socioecological systems.
An appreciation of how education, imagination, and future thinking skills are necessary to ensure a transformation toward an ecological civilization.
An ability to recognize and navigate climate emotions, including in communication with stakeholders with different perspectives and priorities.
An ability to critically evaluate concepts, ideas, actions, and relations for their climate and planetary health consequences.
Program last updated
Fall 2026