Overall Rating Gold
Overall Score 65.86
Liaison Briar Wray
Submission Date March 5, 2025

STARS v3.0

Portland Community College
IL-67: Innovation C

Status Score Responsible Party
Complete 1.00 / 1.00 Stephania Fregosi
Sustainability Analyst
Academic Affairs
"---" indicates that no data was submitted for this field

Name of the innovative outcome, program, or initiative:
Climate Anxiety Workshops and Resources

Does the innovation represent a new, extraordinary, unique, ground-breaking, or uncommon outcome, program, or initiative that addresses a sustainability challenge and is not covered by an existing credit?:
Yes

Narrative and/or website URL providing an overview of the innovation:

In response to a growing demand from students, faculty and staff, the college has developed a number of initiatives to help support our community in regards to climate anxiety and eco grief. Much of this focus began when a faculty librarian utilized their sabbatical to conduct research on eco-anxiety, with support from the student-funded Ecosocial Justice Grant, and shared the results with the college through a series of workshops around emotionally informed climate anxiety and eco grief resources.  

The program has grown significantly since then, and in the past three-years, PCC hosted a series of workshops specific to teaching climate change in the face of climate anxiety and eco-grief. The following sessions were specifically designed for students; there were parallel tracks for faculty and staff:

  • Eco-anxiety + Environmental Justice: How Young People of Color Experience Climate Change with Kiana Kazemi
  • Climate Wisdom Lab - a resilience workshop for students with Kevin M. Gallagher and Josephine Linden
  • Climate Grief: Strategies for Hope and Resilience with Dr. Kim Smith
  • A Field Guide to Climate Anxiety - How to Keep Your Cool on a Warming Planet with author Sarah Jaquette Ray 
  • Climate Talks: Climate Migration Gathering 
  • Lunch and Learn Series, COP 29 and Beyond Climate Action in the Wake of November 2024 (Th, January 16, 2025  12-1), presentation from Dr. Frank Granshaw  (This workshop partially addressed the current political climate in the United States)
  • COP 28 Debrief, PCC Climate Action Plan Update, February 23, 2024

In the years since offering these resources, we've worked to create a new library guide for climate anxiety for faculty. We've also offered several sessions during PCC's teaching conference: the Anderson Conference. In addition, our counseling and guidance office has offered workshops that showcase nature as a way to release stress, and our learning gardens have integrated eco therapy into their offerings as well.

 


Optional documentation

Notes about the information provided for this credit:

Includes fliers and resource guide for the workshops as well as links to resources created for the college such as the PCC library's new climate anxiety guide.


Additional documentation for this credit:

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