The climate crisis, a global challenge, disproportionately affects young people. They face the consequences of environmental changes and policy decisions made today; however, they are often excluded from the decision-making processes. The CCC-CATAPULT project, co-led in Ireland by Dr Kathy Reilly, Lecturer in the field of Human Geography here at University of Galway, offers a powerful platform for young people to actively engage, placing human experiences and perspectives at the forefront and ensuring young people have a voice. In conversation with Cois Coiribe, Dr Reilly delves into the intersection of geography, activism, and education, illustrating how projects like CCC-CATAPULT are a critical shift toward a more inclusive and equitable approach to global discourse. Read more about the project and her involvement as a geographer who’s passionate about positive impact.
Geography is the thread that weaves our capacity to make sense of the world around us, exploring complex relationships between people and their environments, sensitive to diverse places and spaces. As a discipline, it celebrates diversity, its most fundamental level focusing on understanding the multifarious relationships between humans and our environments. Grasping how the nature of that relationship changes over time is at the heart of understanding the challenge of sustainability.
My work focuses on an often-unrepresented community – children and young people. Most recently, I explored how a group of young people in Galway City and County experience climate change and the climate crisis. This was possible through the CCC-CATAPULT project, which stands for Challenging the Climate Crisis – Children’s Agency to Tackle Policy Underpinned by Learning for Transformation. Funded by JPI Solstice and EPA Research, the project brought young people into the research process, working with academics to examine their lived experiences and perspectives on climate change. As part of this initiative, data was co-produced by 16- to 18- year-olds in Galway (Ireland), Bristol (United Kingdom), Tampere (Finland) and Genoa (Italy), positioning Irish youth voices within a broader European framework. The Irish CCC-CATAPULT team was co-led my myself, alongside Professor Frances Fahy and Dr Bronagh Dillon.
It is vital we listen to young people and include their voices in our ongoing efforts to tackle climate change. Young people are the future, but they are also important in the present. Understanding how young people experience this rapidly changing world, and their place in it, is central to developing effective solutions to the common challenges we face.
CCC-CATAPULT engaged over 2,000 young people, teachers and other supporters of climate education in Europe. In Ireland, this included young people from 11 post-primary schools, representing over 800 young people. CCC-CATAPULT also developed a network of Youth Action Partnerships (YAPs), working with small groups of young people in Galway and across Europe in the co-creation of research tools, new knowledge, and understandings about climate crisis, ensuring that young voices were the driving force throughout the research process.
Key findings from the project include:
⇒ Urban and rural differences in climate education, and formal and informal learning spaces, exist in the Galway region, and this has an impact on young people’s engagement with the climate crisis.
⇒ Intergenerational dialogue is seen as key to promoting climate change awareness, agency and trust.
⇒ Teachers and educators require a supply of climate-focused professional development and training opportunities.
⇒ Young people in Galway emphasised the importance of family members’ role in contributing to their informal learning about, and strengthening connections to, places that young people consider of personal significance.
⇒ Although different mechanisms and platforms exist in Ireland, young people maintain that these are limited, and that they still feel marginalised and excluded from national conversations about climate change.
The impact of CCC-CATAPULT’s project was immense: young people were actively engaged in every stage of the research process, from designing the study and piloting of materials to prioritising and communicating the results. This significantly impacted young people’s climate literacy, and contributed to personal development tropes, including confidence, resilience and self-awareness – qualities essential in navigating the uncertainties of a changing climate. From a policy perspective, the impact of CCC-CATAPULT straddled a number of scales. In Ireland, we shared findings with seven local government offices, five national government departments, twelve civil society groups, and two international institutions. This work continues to grow. We disseminated results across the usual academic channels, but more importantly, we have also led numerous community engagement events and delivered five international workshops. This includes a workshop at the Red Cross Youth Summit in 2023. With the launch of CCC-CATAPULT’s toolkit this year, we anticipate further engagement with communities interested in implementing project recommendations around climate change education, intergenerational relationships, and young people’s capacity for transformation.
We advocate for transformative climate change education informed by and through young people’s perspectives. I presented CCC-CATAPULT findings to national consultations for the development of the new Climate Action and Sustainable Development subject for post-primary schools. This is a timely initiative, as geography – globally recognised for its role in helping society understand the challenges of our changing world – faces declining enrolment among young people as a subject in schools in Ireland. This trend places Ireland in a precarious position, as geography hosts the elements of climate literacy – people, place, and environment – at its core.
The introduction of Climate Action and Sustainable Development as a new Leaving Certificate subject, with clear ties to ’people, place and environment’ – the ‘bread and butter’ of geographic knowledge – is a step forward. Enhancing the capacity of young people to address the major challenges of our age requires ensuring that geographers are front and centre in the delivery of climate change education. CCC-CATAPULT’s findings strongly support this need.
Research and policy development are at their most robust when co-productive principles are applied, involving young people in co-designing new or strengthening existing research and policy engagement mechanisms. This approach ensures that, where relevant, young voices are at the centre of policy and decisions affecting their daily lives and futures. Young people clearly evidenced wanting to build on existing climate-related initiatives at national level, while also seeking to get involved in local actions that are inclusive and accessible to all.
Regarding climate change education, CCC-CATAPULT’s recommendations were clear. First, there is a need to create professional, accessible and effective climate-focused classroom resources. These resources must be integrated across all core school subjects, not siloed within one discipline. Second, climate conversations must expand beyond the classroom, fostering intergenerational dialogue that promotes reciprocal and well-informed exchanges among families, communities and wider networks. This holistic approach will strengthen collective understanding and action, empowering young people.
There remains a clear need to further explore issues around intergenerational trust and climate dialogue. Taken cumulatively, our work highlights several critical and emerging research trajectories. There is a growing acknowledgement that young people are burdened with the responsibility of “solving” the climate crisis, while often their opportunities to meaningfully contribute to debates and actions remain limited. This disconnect has led to a sense of mistrust among young people toward adults and their capacity to address climate crisis effectively. A second key issue is the common portrayal of the climate crisis – and the extreme weather events often linked to it – as challenges affecting distant people in faraway places. There is a need to examine the roles of place and proximity in shaping climate conversations.
Undoubtedly, as we move forward, we must capitalise on young people’s willingness to engage in climate action, empowering youth communities to play an active role. In this way, their experiences within global frameworks can allow for a more inclusive, diverse, and intergenerational approach to climate action. This not only bridges the gap between generations but also ensures that youth perspectives are central to creating sustainable and equitable solutions.
CCC-CATAPULT is an embodiment of inclusive and co-productive research, striving to better connect research beyond the academy, creating positive change in the communities where we work. More information on the project can be accessed here: https://ccc-catapult.org/
In 2024 the broader European team launched the CCC-CATAPULT toolkit to support others (educators, supporters of learning, community groups or groups of young people) trying to further understand, begin or continue difficult discussions around climate. The toolkit can be accessed here: https://ccc-catapult.org/project-resources/project-toolkit/
