Projects

Curricular Development

I develop curricula on environment, sustainability, climate and environmental justice. This includes curriculum for higher education, pre-collegiate and K-12 educators and students. Examples include:

The Climate Justice Instructional Toolkit (CJIT) houses a wide-range of adaptable teaching modules, a starter guide and videos for teaching climate justice in higher education contexts.
Day of Climate offers free, hands-on curriculum of lessons and activities designed to introduce K-12 students to research on climate and how it shapes their lives. I participated on two curricular projects: 1. Urban Heat Islands (grades 9-12) & 2. Right Beneath Our Feet: Heating and Cooling with Geothermal Systems (grades 7-12)
The iStronG “All Hands on Deck” curriculum is an Asset-Based, Competency-Based set of 25 lessons, originally designed for the 5 to 6 week TRIO Upward Bound summer program (pre-collegiate); however, the lessons readily lend themselves to modular use in shorter settings. For this project, I developed various climate justice modules.

Research

I work with graduate and undergraduate students on a variety of research projects. Examples of this include:

Paul, S., Rabe, C., Minns, C. (2025) Unsettling the Status Quo: Embedding Environmental Justice in Tech-Centered Environmental Education. Contingencies: A Journal of Global Pedagogy, 3:1, 1-30 [Access Article]
Hampton, L., Schlegel, M., Bultena, E., Liu, J., Dunca, A., Singha, M., Lim, S., Higgins, L., & Rabe, C. (2024). From Mining to E-waste: The Environmental and Climate Justice Implications of the Electronics Hardware Life Cycle. MIT Case Studies in Social and Ethical Responsibilities of Computing. [Access Article]

Instructor Engagement

I work with faculty, instructors and teachers in supporting them to integrate climate education topics into their instructional practice. For example, The Climate, Environment, and Sustainability Infusion Fellowship (CESIF) launched in February 2023 to empower faculty across MIT to cross their disciplinary boundaries and embed topics of climate science, the environment, and sustainability (CES) into the regular undergraduate curriculum.

Student Engagement

I engage students in climate, environment, and sustainability education by overseeing:

The MIT Environment and Sustainability Minor Degree Program, and
The Martin Family Society of Fellows for Sustainability (PhD Fellowship).

Course Development

I co-developed a course entitled Environmental Justice, Science and Technology. This course has seen three iterations: 1. A pilot winter session course, a massive, open-online course (MOOC) in Open Learning, and a full-semester in-person offering in the Department of Urban Studies and Planning at MIT. I am interested in co-developing other courses that review more specific EJ, science and tech issues, climate and emotions, or issues of food justice.

Events & Workshops

I plan, co-plan and facilitate a variety of events and workshops:

Expanding Climate Education at MIT, April, 2025, MIT Cambridge MA (Convener)
Geothermal Energy Networks: Transforming our Thermal Energy System (Two Day Course), MIT, January, 2025 (Co-Organizer; Speaker)
Book Talk with Jennie Stephens: Climate Justice and the University, MIT, February, 2025 (Primary Organizer)
Evening with Bayo Akomolafe, September, 2024, MIT, Cambridge MA (Co-Planned with the Council for Uncertain Human Futures).
The Climate Wisdom Lab Workshop, June, 2024, MIT, Cambridge MA (Co-Planned, Co-Facilitated)
Climate Justice Across the Curriculum Workshop Series, Spring 2024, MIT, Via Zoom (Planned/Organized Speakers).
The Climate, Community, Collaborative (CCC) Symposium, September, 2024, MIT, Cambridge, MA (Served on Planning Committee).
Exploring Climate Change and Emotions: From Distress to Wellbeing, April, 2023, MIT, Cambridge MA (Co-Planned; Co-facilitated)

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