CENTERING UTOPIA: Fostering Youth Climate Change Education by Exploring and Envisioning Hopeful Futures

This design-based research study investigates climate change education during a summer research experience for ten high-school-aged youth in the US southwest. Grounded in a review of literature, we present the design of a ten-hour workshop series that coupled approaches to information literacy and futures thinking by centering activities around utopian thinking. Analyses of the enacted design enlist social interaction and creative media artifacts to demonstrate how the sequenced activities support youth in exploring and envisioning hopeful futures for themselves and their communities. Discussion considers how hopeful futures position youth to exercise agency through the co-development of imagined innovations and co-production of futures narratives about ecologically sustainable transitions toward post-carbon energy systems.