The role of climate change education on individual lifetime carbon emissions

at least five years after having taken the course, and their responses were used to provide both qualitative and quantitative measures of the impact of the course on their attitudes and behavior regarding solutions to climate change. The university course was designed to be impactful, including various elements from the environmental education literature to engage students around personal and social activism. In open-ended feedback and the focus group interviews, students recounted how the course has changed their lives, both personally and professionally. Examples of personal changes included the type of car they drive and the type of food they eat. Examples of professional changes included how they create environmental benefits through their job. The results from the survey data also suggest that the course was impactful, even many years later. Student behavior related to waste decisions, home energy decisions, transpor- tation and food choices all showed significant behavior change that was attributed to the COMM 168 course, and these changes were quantified using a reputable online carbon emis- sions calculator. The estimated reductions in carbon emissions attributed to the COMM 168 graduates are 3.54 tons/year, compared with the carbon emissions for an average California res- ident of 25.1 tons/year. It was found that the participants who had personally experienced the effects of global warming, or felt that global warming will harm them personally, had the largest reductions in carbon emissions. Although a number of studies have established links between

educational programs and environmental quality, such as water or air quality [7], far fewer studies have established causal links between education and carbon emissions [5]. This study suggests that the design of the COMM 168 course provides elements of the three crucial factors that [17] identify as contributing to pro-environmental behavior: entry-level, ownership, and empowerment variables. Surveys and focus group interviews reveal that gradu- ates of the course feel a lasting personal connection to the issue and have confidence in the suc- cess of their actions. This strong sense of personal obligation and the perceived individual agency to address climate change suggest that education that leverages these design elements including community engagement may provide a public benefit. The authors also note that social norms, established through a year-long course and emphasized through various class- room activities, also may have contributed to students’ pro-environmental attitudes and behaviors. However, while previous studies have demonstrated that factors such as having a personal connection (e.g., [23]) and perceived self-efficacy (e.g., [54]) can influence individual behaviors, we acknowledge that other factors are also likely important (e.g., [55]), and under- standing how these factors contribute to individual behavior change is complex [39]; [56]. We also acknowledge that there may be cases where structural factors, such as size of home or dis- tance of commute, may obscure the intentions of pro-environmental behavior [57].

The potential to use education as a climate change mitigation measure would be valuable and in line with other mitigation measures if such reductions as achieved in the COMM 168 course could be achieved in other classrooms. We illustrate this through comparisons with other climate change solutions, and show that at scale, climate change education can be as effective in reducing carbon emissions as other solutions such as rooftop solar or electric vehi- cles. The notion that education is an important part of responding to climate change is not novel (e.g., [29]; [58]), and yet rarely has it been quantified and measured [53]. This paper sheds light on how such measurements could be taken, and it offers a pedagogical insight for how to make education an effective climate change mitigation strategy. At present, the authors are using similar design approaches to develop a comprehensive sci- ence curriculum focused around environmental stewardship and climate action (e.g., [59]; [60]) for middle schools. The Next Generation Science Standards now emphasize applying integrative science fields to solving real-world problems, and this serves as an ideal platform for applying the type of educational platform developed in COMM 168 towards a broader science curriculum for schools. The middle school science curriculum [61] is currently being The role of climate change education on individual lifetime carbon emissions PLOS ONE | https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0206266 February 4, 2020 19 / 23