Developed via funds provided by the California Department of Education through Assembly Bill 130 (2021), the resources were created in response to a need for equitable and comprehensive lessons to address students’ curiosities about the many environmental issues that impact their lives, including wildfires, extreme temperatures, air quality, food waste, groundwater, energy systems and more.
Community organizations, experts in science and ecology, Indigenous communities, curriculum development specialists, youth leaders and educators took part in the materials’ development.
With almost 40 years of experience in education, San Mateo COE Superintendent Nancy Magee shared that the project is one of the most exciting she’s worked on as lessons, which align with state standards across multiple subject areas, are “designed to inspire students to become environmental solution leaders.”
“We want to give kids confidence to deal with the challenges that the environment presents to us now and in the future,” Magee explained. Having a strong knowledge base can also support students’ mental health, lessen climate anxiety and improve academic engagement.
Rather than just covering a topic, the lessons encourage student-led investigations to brainstorm potential ways to solve the environmental challenges California faces, with attention paid to regional phenomena. In the seventh-grade unit on Land Subsidence and Groundwater, for example, students ponder, “Why is the Central Valley sinking, and what can we do about it?” while eighth graders taking the Air Quality lesson focus on how air quality in San Bernardino-Riverside compares to other parts of the state.
Julie Hilborn, the COE’s director of Environmental Literacy and Sustainability, said that one of her favorite lessons is the fourth-grade unit on Power Outages and Energy Systems. Most students have experienced an outage due to factors like high winds, extreme heat or flooding, so it’s relevant to them, she explained.
“They investigate how communities can make wise and equitable energy decisions that address everyone’s needs, because energy really is a big deal in California, and it also has such an effect on climate change,” Hilborn said. “By being able to look at solutions, students can see how communities can adapt while also finding some solutions that will mitigate the impacts. It also empowers them to think critically about energy and climate action.”
She also highlighted the first-grade unit on Food Systems, which students enjoy as they connect with their campus and learn about what happens to the food people don’t consume, including uneaten food during lunch periods. For some, these kinds of lessons may inspire the formation of “Green Teams” to address waste and promote proper recycling practices on campuses while others apply the information to their home lives and change their families’ patterns.
Plans to roll out Seeds to Solutions to as many classrooms as possible and provide related professional development opportunities are underway, and it has already proven to be popular with young people. “Students we’ve seen in the pilot get really excited and are talking about it outside of class and bringing in questions,” Magee said. “We’ve seen kids really latch on.”
Hilborn added that the resources are shared as Google Docs, making it easy for educators to customize them to fit their needs — something she valued as a teacher. COE leaders intend to continually refine the materials to keep them up to date.
Hilborn estimates that San Mateo COE is one of about eight COEs in the state with a dedicated position like hers. In addition to her team, the COE has a director of sustainable construction and facilities.
“He and I work together to help school districts deepen their commitment to environmental literacy and sustainability as well,” Hilborn said. “Seeds to Solutions is just an extension of that work. This office is a leader in California when it comes to this kind of work, so it makes sense that we would be advocating [for it].”
Additionally, the COE partners with the county’s electricity provider, Peninsula Clean Energy, to advance the decarbonization of local campuses among other improvements like replacing traditional water heaters with more efficient heat pump water heaters.
They also have a longstanding relationship with Ten Strands, which has included a program where teachers learn to integrate environmental concepts into their curriculum.
Hilborn reiterated the importance of environmental literacy:
“Preparing students for the future really goes beyond academics, it’s making sure that they’re having meaningful learning experiences that address real-world environmental justice issues,” Hilborn said. “We need to equip them to become solutions-driven leaders in a world that’s increasingly impacted by climate change and help them understand that the solutions already exist, it’s not their job to find the solutions.”
