Let’s Start Thinking about climate change as a modern educational problem—and solve it.

Framing this crisis differently could open up new solutions

By Hunter Gehlbach

We face a problem with the problem of climate change. We can’t seem to decide what kind of problem it is.

Technological? Economic? Geopolitical? This indecision allows us to imagine that the solution rests with someone else — scientists or economists or politicians.

Further, such diffuse ownership of the problem results in newer crises easily taking precedence. Climate change had barely finished taking a backseat to Covid before being demoted by the war in Ukraine, en route to being relegated to the back burner behind the overturning of Roe v. Wade.

Each of these lenses — technological, economic and geopolitical — offers substantial truth. Yet, all have failed to adequately address the challenge.

So, what might a new perspective — climate change as a “modern” educational problem — look like? And how might a new framing help address the crisis?