ASE 2025 Annual Conference

The era of warning about impending ecological disasters has passed. These days we document them. Today’s thirteen-year-olds have already experienced the ten warmest years on record and each passing year will probably be hotter than the last. They are among a generation of young people living with the knowledge that this world, their home, is likely to become less habitable as they grow up. The implications of this for young people, for educators and for education itself are daunting. This is the backdrop to a seminar that will explore the question of how educators’ role(s) might adapt in response to this epoch that we have labelled the Anthropocene.

The seminar will draw on Paul’s research on student-led projects with schools across Europe and on educator competences as well as his role as a teacher educator and his recent work with the youth-led organisation Teach the Future. While making a case for the centrality of emotions in education (particularly in STEM subjects), Paul will consider some of the dangers and double binds inherent in educating about – and advocating for – sustainability in the current political climate. Although rooted in the policy context of England, his talk will highlight issues that are likely to arise in any democratic society with a publicly funded formal education system. If this all sounds rather ominous, rest assured, Paul is not a depressive type. He has always sought pragmatic ways of working with systemic or ‘wicked’ problems and recognises the human need for meaningful sources of hope.