When we talk about sustainability in schools, it’s easy to focus on action—projects, lesson plans, measurable outcomes. But lasting change often starts somewhere quieter: in how we feel, how we reflect, and how we support one another.

Two sessions at this year’s 43^rd COBIS Annual Conference dive into that deeper layer. Love and Fear in a Warming World explores the emotional side of climate change and how educators can connect with their values to support more meaningful climate conversations. Green Goals & Growing Pains shares the story of a student-led initiative that didn’t go as planned—and how a coaching approach helped turn setbacks into growth.

We spoke with Greg Klerkx (Climate Shift) and Sarah Chesworth (Kolej Tuanku Ja'afar) about the shared threads in their work: resilience, connection, and what it really means to sustain ourselves, and our students, for the long haul.

1. What does “sustainable” look like when we apply it not just to the planet, but to how we lead, teach, and learn?

 SC: Sustainability in leadership, teaching, and learning means creating systems and practices that are resilient, regenerative, and balanced over the long term. It’s about pacing ourselves and others to prevent burnout, embedding reflection and adaptability into our routines, and nurturing communities where growth is steady, equitable, and inclusive. It asks us to think beyond quick wins towards long-term impact. Our student leaders developed a vision to “Develop sustainable mindsets” and invited us to work with them to embed this across the curriculum.

GK: To me, meaningful sustainability is about threading climate care and climate awareness through every aspect of our lives, on a daily basis. It’s not a product or a scheme; it’s a mindset.

I watched a TED talk not long ago by Jamie Alexander, Director of Project Drawdown, which is a great resource for climate change information. The premise of her talk was that ‘every job is a climate job’, meaning that now and going forward there’ll be few modes of employment that won’t somehow incorporate climate change into how and why they exist. I believe that same principle should apply in education: every school subject should, at some level, also be a climate subject. There isn’t any topic that can’t be viewed through that lens in a way that enhances the subject at hand while also connecting meaningfully with other topics and ideas.

That isn’t necessarily true now: in my experience, climate education is too often very siloed, usually living in the science curriculum or more broadly – and often amorphously – within school sustainability agendas. But by using a more wide-ranging lens on climate change, students would come to understand that living a ‘sustainable’ life is not just about how much we recycle or how much energy we save. It’s about how we talk with others, how we interrogate our media and cultural choices, who we vote for, what jobs we do and how and why we do them…how we feel about our warming world, and why. It’s about incorporating this awareness into our daily lives such that it’s as natural as breathing.
 

 2.  What’s something you believed about sustainability five years ago that you see differently now?

 SC: Five years ago, I thought sustainability was primarily about environmental stewardship—recycling, reducing carbon footprints, protecting natural resources. Now, I see it as a mindset that touches every aspect of our lives, including how we manage our energy, relationships, and institutions. It’s not just about doing less harm—it’s about actively creating conditions for renewal and flourishing.

Early in my career, I believed we needed to educate students on sustainability by giving them knowledge and solutions. Now, I realise that if we give students a problem to solve, they are more than capable of coming up with creative, effective solutions themselves.

It has also taken me time to recognise that the coaching training I have undertaken—and previously used mainly with staff—can be just as powerful when used with student leaders. In fact, working with students in this way can sometimes have even greater impact, as they bring fresh perspectives and an openness to learning and growth.

 GK: When sustainability programmes first appeared in education and industry some years ago, they seemed like an excellent way for any organisation to engage its people in the climate crisis. Increasingly, though, sustainability agendas feel like another box to tick…often a well-meant box, but in too many instances just another set of activities to go into a report or a presentation, without a broader attachment to how an organisation and its people do what they do.

This surely isn’t universally true, but I do feel that ‘sustainability’ has joined ‘personal carbon footprint’ as a term that feels less meaningful than it once did, perhaps understandably so given that the climate crisis – through virtually every metric – is getting worse and not yet better. Our task as educators, then, may be to reclaim sustainability as something powerful, something more impactful and relevant.

3.  We often talk about empowering students—but what’s something students have taught you about sustainability or leadership?

SC: Students have taught me that sustainability isn’t just a set of principles—it’s a way of thinking creatively and critically about the future. They often approach challenges with fresh optimism and an instinct for collaboration, showing that leadership today isn’t about command and control; it’s about listening, adapting, and building together.

 After getting our teachers to map our approach to sustainability—no easy feat—our student leaders wanted to share not just the end outcomes but their learning journey with others. They organised and hosted a FOBISIA CPD conference at our school, ran a workshop on their findings, and created a model for coaching student leaders. Their workshop received a standing ovation, which was an incredibly proud moment for all of us. They even encouraged me to share our story at COBIS and helped me plan the session so their message could reach a wider audience. I hope I can deliver my workshop to the high standards they set.

 GK: Global warming is an event being experienced by educators and students alike in real time. We are all bombarded on a regular basis with stories of floods, fires, droughts, climate-driven conflict, etc., and this is a stressful and intense experience that I personally feel very keenly, very emotionally. Survey upon survey shows that young people feel this, too, and like me they want this emotional component to be part of the picture when it comes to learning and talking about climate.

This presents an opportunity for educators willing to connect with students around climate change at the level of emotion and vulnerability, which is where students so often live anyhow. I recognise that this level of vulnerability isn’t easy for many educators, and in the same way that children and young people talk most openly with each other, adults need opportunities to explore their feelings and perspectives around climate change with other adults before diving into such conversations with their students. That, in a nutshell, is the gap that Climate Shift is aiming to fill in education.

4.  What would you say to an educator who feels like they have to be an expert before talking about sustainability?

SC: I would say: start from where you are. Sustainability is a shared journey, not a finished product. You don’t need all the answers—you need curiosity, openness, and a willingness to learn alongside your students. Often, the most powerful learning happens when teachers model vulnerability and exploration. If you don’t provide all the answers, students will come up with their own—and they may surprise you.

GK: Sustainability in the way I view it isn’t necessarily about expertise; it’s about a willingness to constantly learn, adapt, evolve, and act on behalf of the planet in every aspect of our lives. That said, if a lack of climate expertise feels like a barrier to action for any educator - and if you aren’t a subject expert in a climate science field (e.g., oceanography, meteorology, glaciology, physics, chemistry, etc.) – chances are that someone on your staff team has some of this expertise and can point you to credible, digestible resources in any of these fields.

If you want to keep up with climate science, politics and policy, you might add a few climate news sources to your regular news feed: I’d recommend Grist, Carbon Brief, and The Climate Question to start. For a gamified crash course in climate science, consider running a Climate Fresk session with your students, in which you’ll learn as much as they do!

5.  Can you give us a glimpse into what participants might experience or take away from your session?

SC: Participants will leave with practical strategies—designed and tested by our student leaders—to weave sustainable mindsets into their leadership and classrooms. They will engage in reflective activities, explore real-world examples, and collaborate on ways to foster resilience, agency, and long-term thinking in their communities. More than anything, we hope they will walk away feeling empowered to take small, meaningful steps that can grow into lasting change for their students.

And hopefully, they'll also learn from the hurdles, ups, downs, and mistakes—both ours and our students’—as we navigated this project. If nothing else, they’ll know that a few wrong turns are part of the journey!

GK: ‘Love and Fear in a Warming World’ is about connecting our values with our strong emotions around global warming to help us teach, learn and live in more meaningful, climate-conscious ways. We’ll do this through a series of scaffolded creative activities that participants will be able to use themselves to start these conversations in their classrooms. You won’t need any prior knowledge of climate science, policy, economics, etc. – we’ll work with knowledge and perspective you bring into the session.

This session, and everything else I do with Climate Shift, is predicated on the belief that being more conscious about our values and emotions – and critically, talking about them with others – is a missing link in climate education and activism. It’s about us as educators, as people, and how we want to relate to each other and our students on this very challenging topic.

That may sound a bit heavy, but participants have regularly said that after our sessions they feel lighter, more energetic, more hopeful. We’re hoping you’ll feel that way, too.