A major research project has been completed by senior students at ICHK, as part of a global education initiative around the climate emergency.

A group of Year 13 students spent the summer working on a research paper, which will now be peer reviewed and submitted for publication.

The team worked with Head of Science Michelle Rines, PHD researcher Smriti Safaya and teachers and university students in Hong Kong on the project.

It followed a call from School Science Review for papers looking at how science education can help people anticipate and respond to the impacts of climate change, and the role science education plays in meeting targets around climate change.

The project has been timed to coincide with the November COP26 (the UN Climate Change Conference) in Glasgow.

After discussing the brief, the students investigated the ways that education systems are preparing young people to tackle climate change.

Among the issues they researched were opportunities for education for climate action in curricular and extra curricular school science; the responsibilities of teachers in relation to climate action and the models that exist for collective action through school science.

During the project, the students explored philosophical questions relating to the climate crisis and science education, conducted a survey across different schools, analysed the data and then wrote a detailed research paper.

We commend the whole team for their commitment to this project, and the effort and hard work that has been put into completing the paper. It is a shining example of student achievement which will be a valuable addition to their Mastery Transcript portfolios, and university applications.