Globally climate change (CC) is scarcely addressed in school curricula, and school graduates are mostly uneducated about climate change. The purpose of this paper is to make a case for conceptualising CC as a discipline, and to further argue why CC should be included in school curricula as a disciplinary-subject. An initial examination of CC in curricula globally reveals that the main approach for including CC in the curriculum is the cross-curriculum approach. The problems associated with this approach are discussed in regard to the challenges posed to the integrity of the CC body of knowledge, and to the teaching and learning. The paper continues to build a case for conceptualising CC as a discipline in its own right. It explains the notions of: disciplines, subjects, and disciplinary-subjects. Further, it describes the disciplinary characteristics of CC, and the benefits of including CC in the curriculum as a disciplinary-subject. However, curricular resistance issues are identified and discussed. These resistances are addressed by considering evidence derived from curriculum theory, cognitive psychology and philosophy of science for supporting the inclusion of a CC disciplinary-subject. Finally, the challenges in establishing a CC disciplinary-subject are discussed. The paper concludes by considering implications for further research.

The present article challenges the prevailing perception in the field of environmental education that acquisition of environmental behavior is an ultimate goal of the educational process, in comparison to acquisition of environmental attitudes, which is perceived as a minor goal. The article presents a compilation of results obtained from two studies that shed new light on the relationship between influences on environmental attitudes and influences on environmental behavior. The results suggest that: (a) among adults, the strategies required for influencing attitudes are different from those required for influencing behaviors; (b) the mechanisms for achieving influence among children are different from those among adults; and (c) conventional educational approaches, such as behavior modification, can influence behavior more easily than they can influence attitudes. The results provide grounds for questioning the prevailing belief that individual acquisition of responsible environmental behavior can drive changes on the global political scale. We suggest increasing the focus of environmental education on construction of attitudes.

The challenge of climate change means that school education is more important than ever in preparing young people for an uncertain future. The focus of this research is climate change education and its status in the compulsory middle school years (approximately years 7–10) across six countries (Australia, Israel, Finland, Indonesia, Canada and England). The authors investigated formal published national curriculum documents, specifically science and geography, to determine the presence of climate change topics, and the way they are addressed in these subjects. The key findings are that: (1) the term ‘climate change’ appears in the formal curriculum of all six countries in science or geography; (2) approaches to climate change in the curriculum differ substantially across different countries; (3) climate change is often presented as a context, example or elaboration for other science concepts rather than a discrete topic; (4) the presence of climate change in most curriculum documents is scattered and spread over multiple years and (5) knowledge about causes of climate change predominates over action and behavioural changes. These findings raise questions as to whether current school curricula provide sufficient guidance for teachers to develop students’ understandings, skills and values regarding climate change.

University-led STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) outreach forms one potential avenue to address the continuing decline of tertiary student enrollments. Yet to-date the impact of these programs is not well understood, due to an historical emphasis on ‘delivering the goods’ that obscures debate on which outreach programs to deliver, why and to whom. At a time in which the academy faces growing pressures to ‘perform,’ it is argued that explicit consideration of program purposes and efforts to assess efficacy may facilitate discussions about the possible role of university-led outreach in attracting school students to STEM careers. This article reports on findings from a study of the outreach efforts at nine Australian universities, revealing two key barriers: limited institutional support structures; and limited explicit consideration of disparate, and at times, competing outreach stakeholder needs. These barriers problematize the contribution that universities can currently make toward raising future STEM aspirations.

Climate change (CC) is widely accepted as the major threat of our time, posing unprecedented challenges to humanity. Yet very little is known regarding the ways in which upper-secondary curricula address the need to educate about this crisis. This study contributes to the field of CC education theoretically and empirically. From the theoretical perspective, the study contributes two CC conceptualisation frameworks: a characterisation of the nature of CC, and a mapping of the scope of CC content knowledge. The empirical contribution consists of examining CC education implementation within upper-secondary curriculum in the state of Victoria, Australia. Specifically we examined the CC conceptualisation and the scope of content present in the Victorian Certificate of Education (VCE) study designs. A total of 10 out of 94 study designs qualified for examination through referencing CC. The findings suggest that none of the study designs present a complete conceptualisation of the nature of CC. Common conceptualisations within the study designs perceive CC as a cause or an outcome, a problem of management, or of technological efficiency. CC content within the study designs is limited, and presents misconceptions, including the assumption that CC is a natural change caused by astronomical and solar systems. A cross-curriculum integration approach within the study designs is found to be ineffective. We conclude that CC presents a paradigm shift which brings about the new discipline of CC. There is a need for curricula reforms to address and incorporate CC as a coherent body of knowledge.