SHBS puts the development of its faculty team at the top priority. In addition to the weekly teaching and research meeting held by each subject group, homeroom teachers’ meeting and new teachers’ training session, it also offers training sessions to improve teachers’ professionalism at its routine faculty meeting held each Tuesday. In one of such professionalism training, principal Chris brought us one session themed "Green Campus Development." 

SHBS attaches great importance to the “green education” of its students. From various kinds of recycling bins (milk cartons, wastepaper, used clothes, etc.) on campus, to the four consecutive years of participation in "Pick Up China" green program and "Building Sustainable Shanghai" PBL program, all of these are green education practices for its students.

With a grand narrative, principal Chris illustrated the dire situation of the climate crisis with figures and graphs, led us to reflect on the environmental protection measures in the past, and inspired us to think about the actions we should take as educators. His sharing inspired us to explore ways to further integrate environmental education into curriculum design and construction to further inspire students to co-shoulder the responsibility of our times.

If we don't take actions soon, our grandchildren will live in hot water.

“Based on current circumstances, about 0.8% of the world’s surface experiences temperatures that make it unsuitable for human life. Indeed, while storms and other disasters are far more dramatic, heat has come to kill many more people, just as enduring droughts do more than anything to destabilize food supplies and induce migration. ”

“Yet that 0.8% jumps to nearly 20% of the earth’s surface in just 50 years. Very, very many people live in those black areas, especially in south and southeast Asia, and they will need to go somewhere.”

“This is the world in which our students will be raising their children. ”

“If we fast forward another fifty years, based on numerous models which so far have proved frighteningly correct, or truthfully actually underestimated rates of warming and the severity of climate impacts, we must then account for a likely five to eight meter rise in sea levels, resulting from significant melting of the polar ice caps and the partial collapse of the Greenland ice sheet. ”

“This then is the world in which our student’s grandchildren will spend their later years.”

“How can we reckon, honestly, with likely catastrophe of this magnitude?”

“Ignorance doesn’t seem advisable, and contrarian arguments and denialism has, hopefully, become exhausted as it has been exhausting in delaying a widespread appreciation of this reality. Nor, however comforting it may be on a personal, does nihilism feel appropriate. ”

“To focus then on honesty: I hope we can consider ways to reshape our teaching and learning and our green campus development. ”

“Begin from, rather than having as an endpoint, the nature of our climate crisis. ”

“Organize subject learning in ways that encompass the skills required to comprehend our current circumstances. ”

“Move beyond the classroom, yet do more than plant trees and compost for a school garden. ”

“Connect to finance and infrastructure and eldercare. ”

“Focus on those skills, not just scientific, but in terms of communication, cooperation, and action. ”

“Link the scientific to the humanities from the ground up. ”

“As I hoped to do at the outset, reshape the narratives which inform our understanding, and give faculty—and especially students—space to explore and reconfigure new approaches. ”

“An example might be to decenter people from those narratives, focusing perhaps on water or other natural resources, or taking the atmosphere as more essential than the earth itself. ”

“Use consensus to create goals and establish accountability, which acknowledging the significant challenges faced—ask questions about what sustainability means, and how it relates to individual needs within a complex and competitive world. ”

“An enormous amount of daunting work. ”

“I know in the wake of Covid we are all exhausted, yet I believe we must take on this enormous challenge with urgency. Whether we like it or not, our days are already numbered. ”