Earth Authors for Climate Change 

The Earth Authors for Climate Change (EACC) global book launch took place on November 18 (virtually) and November 19 (in Chennai, India), inviting guests from around the world to hear from authors between the ages of 10 and 15 about the books they wrote to bring attention and action to the negative effects of climate change.

EACC is a book-authoring program that amplifies children’s unheard voices on climate change, especially those belonging to underprivileged communities. This year, the EACC was implemented with a cohort of 18 students in Chennai, India. It was a six-month-long, blended program. The initial 6 weeks were spent learning about climate change and its impact on Chennai and on the mechanics of creative writing. Learning experiences involved lectures, videos, meetings with climate activists, student-conducted ethnographic research with members of marginalized communities, and field trips. The rest of the 4.5 months were spent writing storybooks, illustrating, and digitally designing the books.

Click here to learn more about Earth Authors for Climate Change

Aneesa Jamal is a 2023 CEE-Change Fellow and the facilitator of the Earth Authors for Climate Change program. As the founder and head of Cogitation Club and of Al Qamar Academy, a school in Chennai, India, Aneesa (she/her) has over a decade of experience in being a community leader. Aneesa’s CEE-Change Fellowship Climate Action Plan is to create a network of educators who will implement the EACC across India by creating a curriculum playbook, recruiting, and training educators, and signing up schools. . 

Click here to learn more about the CEE-Change Fellowship

Meet the Authors

On November 18, sixteen authors, aged 10–15 were interviewed by NAAEE staffperson, Carrie Albright. Each student was given the opportunity to describe their story and speak to their inspiration, their process, and the message they wanted the reader to take away from the book.

Visit the Cogitation Club Earth Authors' webpage to read each digital book and watch the 5-minute interview with each author. Visit the Earth Authors for Climate Change YouTube playlist to see Carrie's interviews with all sixteen of the authors. 

About the Earth Authors for Climate Change

The Earth Authors for Climate Change (EACC) is a book-authoring program that amplifies children’s unheard voices on climate change, especially of those belonging to underprivileged communities. The program gives children opportunities to express their lived experience of climate change in book form. Their insights will add to the marginalized systems of knowledge that are often overlooked by decision-makers on climate mitigation and resilience. In doing so, children will improve their climate literacy, creative and critical thinking as well as problem-solving skills.  The outcomes of the program are in line with UN SDG 4 (Quality Education), SDG 13 (Climate Action), and SDG 17 (Partnerships for Goals). The EACC also meets the objectives for Education for Sustainable Development.

About Cogitation Club

Cogitation Club aims to fill the gap in regular schooling by teaching critical thinking, developing intellectual independence, and nurturing creativity, curiosity, and originality through a variety of interdisciplinary programs. Cogitation Club was created by the founders of the erstwhile Al Qamar Academy, an innovative micro-school. Cogitation runs two signature children’s book authoring programs, the Earth Authors Program & Kaatib(a), through which they have mentored over 56 child-authored storybooks.  

Learn more about Cogitation Club

About Youth Conservation Action Network (YouCAN)

Youth Conservation Action Network (YouCAN) is a non-profit organisation founded with the vision of an Earth Educator in every Indian School and learning space in India. Our singular mission is to find, train, and nurture at least 10,000 young educators by 2033 who introduce students to the natural world and the intricacies of climate change, and teach them meaningfully to take action. For this, we produce films, organise communities, foster dialogue, create open-source learning materials, and run a year-long fellowship program for young environmentalists, school teachers, and informal educators who are present in 19 Indian States across India. We work for a world where all education is green education.

Learn more about Youth Conservation Action Network 

About the schools that participated in EACC

Sunnyside Learning Initiatives

Sunnyside is an initiative to break free from the shackles of conventional schooling and explore experiential learning to create meaningful, engaging and deep learning experiences for kids. Our values include creating a culture of trust, respect, independence, collaboration & kindness. We believe that when learning is done under no coercion and there is an intrinsic motivation driving it, education happens. Hence, our pedagogical approach is rooted in the belief that learning happens through experiences like travel, conversations, and hands-on activities followed by reflections. This enables a deeper form of learning to make better connections between theories in classes to real-world scenarios and to recognise the interdisciplinary nature of real life. It further gives kids an insight into their own skills, interests, and passions. To learn more, visit Sunnyside Learning Initiatives.

Scholars Academy

Scholars Academy is a unique Montessori Resource Center offering an innovative approach to education. Child-oriented pedagogy focuses on independent learning and nurtures leaders and change-makers. 

The Montessori environments are scientifically prepared to meet the needs of the child. The prepared Scholars Academy provides freedom of choice in mixed-age group environments to enable children to learn how to make responsible choices in their path of learning. The Centre is committed to providing a modern, child-friendly, non-pressured learning environment. The school believes that such an environment is essential for a child to love learning for a lifetime. To learn more, visit Scholars Academy.