About the project
The interdisciplinary modeling tool NorESM2-DIAM is developed within NFR project "Climate Change Modeling and Prediction of Economic Impact". There is great potential to do groundbreaking research with this tool, but here we propose to also integrate this research with an innovative teaching approach, that fully embraces the interdisciplinary nature of the problem of global warming. Teaching related to this topic has so far typically been too narrow in scope, both at Norwegian Universities and beyond, with each course focusing on a single aspect of the issue. In the future, we envision a transition to a new and more holistic teaching paradigm, and would like to aid this transition by developing a course that offers a new way to teach students about the real-world trade-offs that decision-makers are faced with under global warming. Through course activities we also expect to generate novel student-involved publishable research in the interface between climate physics, economics and game theory. A complementary seminar-based course will also be developed, in which students learn how to become participants in the scientific and public discourse on the topic of climate change and the associated societal consequences.
IMAGINE will be an interdisciplinary collaborative effort, including academic institutions in Norway and the US, as well as a Norwegian industry collaborator (Hubro Education). Hubro will explore the potential for developing the former course described above into an online climate simulation game for the modern classroom. Through the proposed activities, IMAGINE will contribute to INTPARTs goal of enhancing quality in research and teaching, as well as strengthen the interlinkages between the two. IMAGINE will further enhance the collaboration of Norwegian institutions with one of the highest-ranked universities worldwide (Yale University).
Objectives
WP1: The Climate Casino: Establishing a new interdisciplinary course. A majority of the resources and the efforts in IMAGINE will be dedicated to develop a new
interdisciplinary course for master students (10 ECTS).
WP2: Keeping up with the Research Frontier: Establishing, developing and supporting seminar courses. Complementing WP1, the project will in WP2 aim to establish and support the development of a seminar course (5 ECTS) targeting Master and PhD students, in which students learn how to become participants in the scientific and public discourse on the topic of climate change and the associated societal consequences.
WP3: The more the merrier – involving students in publishing. Building on WP1 and WP2, WP3 aims to engage Master students in peer reviewed publishing and research-related outreach to a larger extent
WP4: Gaming and Climate Change – a partnership with powerful potential. After having offered the course described in WP1 at all three partner institutions, WP4 will in the final stages of IMAGINE begin the early phase of development of an even more innovative teaching approach through Hubro’s well-established simulation games.
Financing
The project is funded from the Research Council of Norway in the INTPART-International Partnerships for Excellent Education and Research. The project number is 309377.
The project period is from October 2020 through September 2023.
Cooperation
This project will be done in collaboration with researchers from Yale University, Nord University, Hubro Education and Department of Geosciences, University of Oslo.