Close Close

Climate Crisis Teach-In 2025

Wake Up to Climate Change

The climate crisis or climate emergency is a threat to life on earth as we know it and will bring immense suffering. The goal of the climate crisis teach-in is to generate discussion about climate impacts and solutions with the goal of improving life for humans and other living things.

The Climate Crisis Teach-in is an ongoing event in the 2024–2025 school year. If you would like to contribute an event or have questions please contact Catherine Duckett, Ph.D., director, or Michelle Schapakow, Ed.D, co-director.

Upcoming Events

Surviving Climate Change in an Authoritarian State

Monday, Feb. 17th, 2025, 4:30-5:50 p.m. | Edison Hall Room 201

The Indigenous Amazigh people of the High Atlas Mountains in Morocco are one of the world’s oldest cultures, and they have handed down practices that have helped them survive several millennia of environmental changes in North Africa. However, they live under the authoritarian rule of King Mohammed VI and they are prevented from using these tools while at the same time some villages ran out of drinking water two summers ago. How will they survive these next few decades when they face grinding poverty and political oppression? In fact, they have a plan and it is one that everyone should hear. 

Leading this Teach-In is Dr. Peter J. Jacques, the Rechnitz Family/UCI Endowed Chair in Marine and Environmental Law and Policy within the Department of Political Science and Sociology. This event is part of the Climate Crisis Teach-in at Monmouth University, and sponsored by the Council for Endowed Chairs and the Institute for Global Understanding.

Previous Events in the 2025 Teach-In

Exploring the “How” of Sustainability Transformations

Monday, Jan. 27, 2025, 6:30 p.m. | Pollak Theatre

Speaker Dr. Robin Leichenko

Addressing the climate crisis and related challenges provides many opportunities for promoting sustainability transformations. Yet significant questions remain about what such transformations might entail, how to support them, and how to sustain and scale these efforts. This talk explores the practical, political, and personal dimensions of transformation, drawing upon the model of the “Three Spheres of Transformation”. The talk also considers recent efforts to promote sustainability transformations, based upon the speaker’s work with university students and her on-going research on bicycling and non-motorized transportation infrastructure. The talk discusses implications and lessons learned from these case examples for fostering and supporting transformative change.

Robin Leichenko, Ph.D., is a distinguished professor of geography as well as dean of Social and Behavioral Sciences at Rutgers University. Her research explores the economic and equity dimensions of climate change impacts, vulnerability, and adaptation. Leichenko has led or served on climate change assessments for the City of New York, New Jersey, New York State, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). The second edition of her book, “Climate and Society: Transforming the Future” (Polity Press, with Karen O’Brien), was released in summer 2024.