PAESC Giovani / SECAP Youth is an action-research project by INDIRE, carried out with EuCliPa.IT (the network of EU Climate Pact Ambassadors) and in collaboration with the CMCC Foundation. It aims to promote the active participation of schools in local climate policies, enhancing their role in Sustainable Energy and Climate Action Plans (SECAP/PAESC) for Municipalities. Schools are strategic civic infrastructures: they host vulnerable populations, safeguard neighborhoods, and provide ideal spaces for nature-based solutions (NBS), generating co-benefits for urban resilience, well-being, and the learning process.

The project recognizes schools as actors in environmental decision-making processes (citizen engagement), involving teachers and students in designing climate-change adaptation actions, particularly through NBS and urban regeneration interventions. The project also maps the needs emerged within school communities, identifies suitable NBS, aligns governance and metrics with SECAP/PAESC and Climate Risk and Vulnerability Assessments (RVA) of the Municipalities, and enhances student participation in line with GreenComp (relationship with nature; collective and political action).

The initiative includes comparisons between municipalities with and without SECAP/PAESC, an integrated environmental–educational–social assessment, and specific attention to environmental justice and equitable access to nature. Each school is supported by an EU Climate Pact Ambassador, who facilitates dialogue with the relevant municipality up to the definition of a school–administration pact. Several actions are currently underway.

Beyond the design of adaptation measures, the project aims at strengthening the relationship between students and nature in order to improve their  health and learning processes, in line with the biophilia hypothesis (E.O. Wilson, 1984). Evidence shows that being in contact with natural elements improves the attention span (ART; Kaplan & Kaplan, 1989; Kaplan, 1995), working memory, and self-regulation, reduces stress, and favours an overall well-being. By doing so, it counters “the extinction of experience” (Pyle, 1993) and the  “generational amnesia” (Kahn, 1999).

There is also another line of research which is related — Urbanatura: toward a biophilic transformation of Italian schools (ongoing), developed with UNature, La Sapienza University for statistical work, and in collaboration with Icastic for the comparative database: it documents access to nature in major urban centers, as well as the presence (including visual presence) of nature in school environments, and evaluates its effects on attention span, well-being, and involvement

The EU Climate Pact Ambassadors are:

• Luciana Favaro
• Martina Meocci
• Domenico Pecere
• Gianni Tartari
• Monica Salvia
• Arianna Giovannini
• Carlo Spista

Collaborators:

• Vincenza Balzano
• Margherita Gobbo

Teachers

• Giuseppina Cardillo
• Simona Del Bravo
• Anna Petrini
• Adriana Rispoli
• Daniela Carmen Solano
• Francesca Moscato
• Maria Arcangela Nigro
• Luca Molinari
• Solano Maria

[Translated by Vincenza Balzano (Euclipa.IT)]

This project is undertaken in the context of the European Climate Pact Ambassador’s voluntary role. The opinions expressed are those of the author(s) alone and should not be considered as representing the official position of the European Commission.