Global Classroom for Addressing the SDGs through Coordinated Local Actions

Through primary and secondary research to develop a curriculum for Mission 4.7, the Capstone team believes that sustainability is impossible without using frameworks of ecofeminism and planetary citizenship to see a true just transition. For three months, the team conducted secondary research considering these frameworks and met with experts in educational design to devise a first draft of a sustainability curriculum. The primary research was conducted in Bhopal, India with a nonprofit called Mahashakti Seva Kendra. There, the team  used their devised lesson plans and adjusted them as they learned from student interest. Their secondary research indicated the need to consider global citizenship and connectivity, but the primary work reinstated the importance of gender equity and decolonial thought in environmental advocacy. From their time in Bhopal, the team shifted their lesson plans from just transition theory to mindfulness exercises, personal value exploration, and group conversations about what justice means in various contexts. The team found that building upon gender equity, collaboration, and mutual care to later discuss sustainability helped better articulate all of these concepts and the connections between them.