Education in the age of climate change and the risk of mass extinction

Abstract

Humanity is facing serious environmental problems of its own making that may lead to mass extinction, with a million species at risk according to the UN. The purpose of this research was to determine how education can contribute to the solution of environmental problems. It was an exploratory research, in which surveys with open and closed questions were applied to 5 education professionals with knowledge of the most important environmental problems such as climate change, environmental pollution, hunger and thirst, loss of biodiversity, war, violence, and coastal erosion and flooding caused by rising sea levels, to categorize them by importance, their possible impact, the urgency of facing them and evaluate whether education develops in students the knowledge and skills to solve them, the most urgent and those with the greatest impact. Respondents stated that students are not developing the skills, ethics and values ​​necessary to reverse the environmental situation, so education should be directed towards sustainable development and environmental recovery.