Ten Strands and UndauntedK12 work together on initiatives that center on decarbonizing every school building to ensure that school buildings and grounds are resilient and can support student health, safety, learning, and development in a time of rapidly increasing extreme weather.
CLIMATE READY SCHOOLS COALITION
The Climate Ready Schools Coalition, launched in 2022, has grown from a handful of organizations to over thirty diverse groups representing various education and climate policy perspectives. The Coalition is a statewide group of education, climate, health, youth, labor, civil rights, and business leaders and organizations with a mission to ensure that California’s public school buildings and grounds are developed as sites of ecological resilience and sustainability in this era of rapid climate change—securing students’ health, safety, and learning through extreme weather events, environmental hazards, and other disruptions.
The Coalition published a report in March 2023, Climate-Resilient California Schools: A Call to Action, which explores the challenges of climate change from the perspective of children’s health and education and laid out a California Master Plan for Climate-Resilient and Sustainable Schools, a transformative and cost-effective $150 billion investment to align California’s TK–12 system with its statewide public health and climate mitigation goals.
In 2024, the Coalition is focused on six different advocacy priorities, which can be tracked on the 2024 Agenda on the Climate Ready Schools Coalition page. Learn more about the Coalition’s evolution in the March 2024 Ten Strands newsletter.
UNDERSTANDING CLIMATE IMPACTS AND CLIMATE ADAPTATIONS FOR SCHOOLS – PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT IN PARTNERSHIP WITH CCEE
In Spring 2024, Ten Strands launched a new partnership with the California Collaborative for Educational Excellence (CCEE) and UndauntedK12 to support district and county leaders with resources and tools for managing the impacts of our changing climate to adapt and become climate resilient. This partnership highlights practices and tools for managing climate by leading districts and county offices of education through “Open Door Learning Session” webinars and “Spotlight Story” articles, and will culminate with a toolkit and white paper.
Resources for Further Exploration
- Open Door (webinar) 1 – April 2024: Prepare for a New Normal: Climate Emergencies and Their Impact on Schools. This first Open Door Learning Session focused on the need to transition to a “climate-ready mindset” and set the foundation for future conversations. Check out the resources, slides, and video from this exciting conversation.
- Open Door (webinar) 2 – May 2024: Energy and Grid Resilience: Mitigating Risk through Climate Adaptation. This Open Door Learning Session featured innovative leaders from Yolo County Office of Education, Santa Barbara Unified School District, and Modesto City Schools. These forward-thinking districts shared their pioneering climate adaptation strategies that enhance resilience and drive significant cost savings. Check out the slides and video from this insightful conversation.
- Open Door (webinar) 3 – August 2024: Mitigating outdoor extreme heat: how schoolyard greening is critical for resilience. This Open Door Learning Session highlighted the issue of extreme heat on school playgrounds and showcased how Pasadena Unified School District and Long Beach Unified School District have successfully greened their schoolyards. Their efforts aim to combat rising temperatures and create safer, more sustainable play environments for students. Check out the slides and video from this insightful conversation.
- Spotlight 1: Climate Change and Emergency Management: How the San Mateo County Office of Education Helps Districts and Schools Become Climate Ready. This resource shares the story of how San Mateo COE has incorporated climate adaptation into emergency planning and response protocols, building on their extensive work with environmental literacy and sustainability.
- Spotlight 2: From Outages to Opportunities: Santa Barbara USD’s Green Microgrids and Economic Benefits. This case study shares how Santa Barbara Unified School District is leading the way in sustainability with the installation of solar-powered microgrids at multiple school sites. This innovative approach not only ensures that students can continue learning during power outages but also contributes to climate resilience and significant cost savings.
- Spotlight 3: Stormwater Management: How San Carlos School District and Flows to Bay Partnered to Mitigate and Prepare for Storm-Based Flooding. This spotlight highlights how San Carlos School District launched the Resilient San Carlos Schoolyards Project in response to extreme weather challenges. Partnering with local experts and utilizing the California Resilience Challenge Grant, the district expanded from small initiatives like rain barrels to large-scale greening efforts, including water-efficient systems, rain gardens, and tree plantings. The project involved extensive community engagement, resulting in design plans for three school sites and a report with recommendations for future implementation.
VIRTUAL POLICY FORUMS
Ten Strands has partnered with UndauntedK12 to lead virtual policy forums that highlight critical topics and resources related to Sustainability and Climate Resilient Schools. See below to access the archived virtual policy forum resources.
High Heat Virtual Policy Forum – December 2023
On December 12, Ten Strands, UndauntedK12, and the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation (LCI) hosted a Policy Forum for heat resilient schools: Protecting Student Health and Learning with Heat-Resilient Schools. The policy forum was moderated by Ten Strands and outlined how extreme heat is a growing problem for California’s schools, and included the following highlights:
- Dr. Kelly Turner presented her research, policy brief, and factsheets that detail solutions for protecting Californians with heat-resilient schools.
- UndauntedK12 shared how to access federal funding from the Inflation Reduction Act to help schools adapt to extreme heat. And provided a summary of talking points and ideas that legislators, legislative staff, and agency leaders should consider to elevent the need for adaptation and mitigation of extreme heat at schools.
Climate-Resilient California Schools – May 2023
In April 2023, the Stanford Center for Innovation in Global Health supported the virtual policy forum for the Climate Resilient California Schools Call to Action Report. The forum discussed the recommendations outlined in the report, and featured a number of key speakers including State Senator Nancy Skinner, State Senator Lena Gonzalez, Dr. Mary A. Dewan (Santa Clara County Superintendent), Kim Patillo Brownson (State Board of Education), Leah Stokes (Rewiring America), Dr. Lisa Patel (Stanford University), Jeff Vincent (UC Berkeley Center for Cities and School), Jonathan Klein (Undaunted K12), and Andra Yeghoian (Ten Strands) to discuss the policy landscape and the path ahead to achieve climate-resilient schools in California.
