Metanoia exists to help schools unlock the sustainability learning that is embedded in the school’s campus and daily life, and develop the capacity of students and schools to do the practical and intellectual work of becoming sustainable and eco-literate communities.
Education for sustainability is more than just a new curriculum. It is about how the content and the process of education can be interwoven with real-life contexts to create opportunities for young people to take the lead in building sustainable communities and societies.
Schools are a microcosm of the city. They share the same environmental problems – waste, air quality, energy inefficient buildings, carbon emissions etc.
Just like the city, schools are constrained by space, money and time. And in a school, just like the city, there are diverse interests that aren’t always aligned.
But, at the scale of the school, the seemingly daunting sustainability challenges of the city become addressable – they show up at a scale that students can get their arms around, in a system that’s easier for them to influence, on a timeframe in which outcomes are more quickly apparent.
So rather than just being a place where students learn about sustainability problems, schools are an ideal context in which to model sustainability solutions and cultivate eco-literacy.
The campus can be a living laboratory. And if we get it right on campus, schools can show the city how it’s done.
Schools can show us the sustainable future we want.
In one sense, the world’s not such a big place – from one person (100) to the whole planet (109) is only 9 steps. But let’s face it, trying to influence everyone just isn’t practical.
On the other hand, influencing just a few people doesn’t have much impact. Perhaps there’s a trade-off between a scale that’s easy and one that makes a difference. Maybe there’s a sweet spot somewhere in the middle?
Turns out it’s 105 … or roughly the population of 100 schools and the school system is a great vehicle for scaling change. Which is why, at Metanoia, we’re focusing on schools. 100 of them to start with for optimum reach and optimum impact.
And we’ll scale from there. When you do the math, it would only take 10,000 Metanoia’s to change the world.
