Summer Institutes
The Importance of Global Workforce Skills
Dates: June 10-11, 2024
Time: 9:00 am-4:00 pm
Where: in person West Bank, University of Minnesota
CEUs: 14 contact hours
Cost: free
Register here (Registration deadline June 1, 2024 or until full)
In order to graduate prepared for success and employment in a global economy, career and technical education students must have the workforce readiness skills enabling them to work with people from diverse backgrounds, for foreign-owned companies, and on global issues and challenges affecting their pathway (such as supply chain issues and international standards and regulations). This workshop will help educators understand global workforce readiness skills, how they link to career pathways, and how to integrate global skills and content into what is already being taught in the classroom. Faculty will leave this hands-on, interactive workshop with a syllabus infused with new content to more deeply engage their students while meeting required standards and objectives.
Co sponsored by the Institute for Global Studies and the African Studies Iniative, Title VI National Resource Centers at the University of Minnesota.
Climate Change and Sustainable Development in Africa
Dates: June 17-18, 2024
Time: 9:00am-3:30 pm
Where: in person West Bank, University of Minnesota
CEUs: 13 contact hours
Cost: free but must register. Includes parking and lunch
Register here (Registration deadline June 3, 2024 or until full)
The vulnerability of the African continent to climate change cannot be overstated. According to a recent article, “due to the widespread impacts of climate change” Africa is “losing 5% to 15% of its gross domestic product growth annually. Seventeen of the twenty countries most affected by climate change are located in Africa.”
The purpose of this institute is to share current knowledge, resources, and ideas about climate change mitigation, climate change adaptation, and climate justice in Africa with educators to enable them to develop classroom materials that they will use in their various curricula. We will examine multiple case studies on the African continent to learn how Africans are focusing on solutions to the changes they experience.
Invited Guest Speakers:
- Dr. Lydia Kitonga, Head of the Department of Agricultural Sciences, Kisii University, Kenya
- Dr. Judith Odhiambo, Head of the Department of Agricultural Education and Extension, Kisii University, Kenya
- Dennis Mugambi- Graduate Student, College of Food and Agricultural Science, UMN
- Chidi Chidozie - Hennepin County Master Gardener
- Dr. Teddie M. Potter - Clinical Professor, Director of Planetary Health, UMN
- Melvine Anyango Otieno - Founder, Planetary Health East Africa Hub, PHD Candidate at MLU Halle (Saale)
Co-sponsored by the African Studies Initiative (ASI), a Title VI National Resource Center in the Institute for Global Studies at the University of Minnesota and University of Minnesota Extension, Global Initiatives.
Educators who attend this institute AND the Schools for the Planet, June 25-27, 2024 (an international Title VI, College of Education and Human Development Center for Climate Literacy, and Minnesota Writing Project institute) will receive an additional three books such as Every Leaf a Hallelujah, Wangari Maathai: The Woman Who Planted a Million Trees, and We Are Water Protectors.
Schools for the Planet Toward Universal Climate Literacy with Children’s Literature and Media Summer Institute for Educators
Dates: June 25-27, 2024
Time: 9:00 am-1:30 pm
Where: in person East Bank, University of Minnesota
CEUs: 13.5 contact hours
Cost: free but does not include parking or lunch
Register here (Registration deadline June 13, 2024 or until full)
We are a climate illiterate civilization that has sleepwalked into climate breakdown, biodiversity crash, and unprecedented social inequalities that exacerbate planetary ecocide. To turn this around, we need to transform our wealth-based, extractive civilization into a sustainable and equitable ecological civilization. This transition requires that we build universal climate literacy. It makes our classrooms ground zero for this effort.
In this three-day summer school, literacy educators Nick Kleese, Jana Lo Bello Miller, and Stephanie Rollag Yoon will guide you to engage with pedagogical practices of envisioning, embodying, and enacting climate literacy education in your classroom. You will learn why traditional climate change education (CCE), focused on scientific and environmental facts, is inadequate to address the social, racial, and political dimensions of climate change. You will explore climate literacy as a broader competence that includes climate science but focuses primarily on developing attitudes and values aligned with how we should live to respect our planetary home. You will learn why stories for young people—in books, films, games, and other narrative media—are the best technology for the social transformation that ensures everyone’s future: a technology that makes climate literacy accessible to every student everywhere and our students are eager to engage in action around climate change.
This summer school will be offered in person from 9:00 am-1:30 pm. Participants will receive 13.5 CEUs, a picturebook, resource kit, and more. This course is appropriate for teachers across grade levels and subject areas, and is offered in collaboration with the Minnesota Writing Project and the Institute for Global Studies.
Educators who attend this institute AND the Climate Change and Sustainable Development in Africa, June 17-18, 2024 (an African Studies Initiative institute) will receive an additional three books such as Every Leaf a Hallelujah, Wangari Maathai: The Woman Who Planted a Million Trees, and We Are Water Protectors.
Becoming a Woman in Africa
Date: June 16-18, 2024
Time: 9:00 am-2:30 pm
Where: in person West Bank, University of Minnesota
CEUs: 17 contact hours
Cost: free but must register. Includes parking and lunch
Register here (Registration deadline July 2, 2024 or until full)
Through a close engagement with selected oral, visual, audio-visual, and written sources, the institute specifically considers the ways African women have played a pivotal role in the dynamic changes that have transformed the continent and its diverse societies. Through the stories of African women whose destinies have changed the course of history, learners will gain a better understanding of African societies and the ways in which women navigate social expectations.
Institute led by NJERI GITHIRE, who is an Associate Professor of African American and African Studies at the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, where she teaches courses in African literature, cinema, and popular culture. She is especially interested in developing pedagogical and curriculum-related projects which bring to light the crucial role that African women have played throughout history’s defining moments
Sponsored by the African Studies Initiative (ASI), a Title VI National Resource Center in the Institute for Global Studies at the University of Minnesota.
Building Bridges of Understanding, Practical Approaches to Genocide Education
Dates: August 5-8, 2024
Where: In person, University of Minnesota West Bank, Minneapolis MN
Sponsored by the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Education at the University of Minnesota