CHARLOTTE WILLIS Charlotte is a freelance journalist and health writer who has worked with Veganuary and The Vegan Society and other online vegan publications. Her fields of expertise and interest include vegan nutrition, holistic healthcare, mindfulness and fitness.
The world is getting warmer, the seas are rising, yet climate change education remains a non-essential subject. There is a gap in knowledge between young people today and the importance of our youth in making a U-turn on climate change.
The health of the environment around us is deteriorating, and it’s deteriorating pretty quickly. Despite rising summer temperatures, widespread global climate disasters, rising ocean levels, melting ice caps and global emissions of greenhouse gasses continually soaring, there still exist climate change naysayers, who refuse to acknowledge that the planet we call home is in need of serious, imminent action. These naysayers do more than troll Greta Thunberg on Twitter. Some prominent government figures are also naysayers, who continue to vote on climate change policies on a global scale, despite being unlikely to witness the adverse effects of their non-committal statements and policies in the future.
The worst affected in the climate change disaster will be the youngest generations walking (or crawling) the Earth today. Unfortunately, our children and grandchildren are likely to witness the aftermath of decades worth of climate neglect, and will ultimately become responsible for cleaning up after the disappointingly lackadaisical previous generations. However, in order for these next generations to become the curators of change, they first need to learn about the issues they face, and this is where the problem of a knowledge gap in climate awareness and sustainability begins to factor into the future of our planet.