Justice, Equity, Diversity and Inclusion (JEDI) Commitment
Where we stand.
At ECCLPs, we strongly believe that justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion (JEDI) efforts will be achieved through meaningful and tangible outcomes through both systems and local community organizations at the forefront of the issues.
ECCLPs’ Core Beliefs
We center the following core beliefs and values in our work:
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We value the knowledge of indigenous cultures in leading, understanding, and mitigating climate challenges.
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Building partnerships and sharing knowledge and resources can amplify the impact of our climate literacy efforts.
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ECCLPs believes that communities should be actively engaged in addressing climate issues affecting them and authentically included in the process of identifying and developing solutions with key partners.
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Acknowledging that solutions must be developed in context for them to be effective, we seek to make place-based climate solutions through education relevant to different communities.
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ECCLPs believes that education, particularly within PK-12 schools, can be a catalyst for climate and environmental actions, justice, and solutions.
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Prioritizing marginalized communities aligns with the principle of climate justice, ensuring those most affected receive the support they need to thrive. We seek to eliminate systemic barriers and inequities, while advancing equitable access to resources and opportunities.
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Keeping justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion at the core of decision-making ensures that our actions align with these principles as we work to combat and thrive through the climate emergency.
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We acknowledge that addressing climate change is a multifaceted challenge and it calls for approaches that bridge different subject areas while engaging both systems and local community organizations at the forefront of the issues.
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By being transparent about our goals, progress, and active evaluation of our efforts, ECCLPs aims to improve our effectiveness.
With these values at the forefront, ECCLPs exists to advance climate and environmental justice literacy with and for PK-12 schools to catalyze climate action and solutions needed to fight climate change.
We aim to catalyze climate solutions through education and collaboration.
Working with pre- and inservice PK-12 teachers, our primary goal is to envision and broadly implement inter- and transdisciplinary approaches to climate literacy that focus on culturally relevant solutions, activate community-driven action, honor indigenous ways of knowing and being, and support those most impacted by the climate crisis. We center historically marginalized communities and peoples as they contribute the least to carbon emissions fueling the crisis, but are unjustly suffering more from the impacts and environmental injustices further exacerbated by the climate emergency.
Developing the measures needed to track the impact of our work will take time. We will be transparent with our partners and supporters throughout that process. In order to improve our efforts to effectively and efficiently meet the needs of PK-12 students and teachers, we will connect our educational initiatives with leading organizations and institutions to amplify current efforts around climate literacy and share our learnings, research, and resources broadly to become a trusted local, statewide, and global partner.
To hold ourselves accountable in transparent ways, we will continue to rely on data, hold listening sessions with our partners, and iterate on our JEDI goals. Leveraging the power of partnerships between the UC and CSU university systems along with our local community leaders, we are committed to holding justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion at the core of our decision-making and programming as we help bend the curve to hope and action on the climate emergency.
This statement was crafted in collaboration with our DEI consultant, Lily Zheng
We especially thank our ECCLPs leaders for shaping this JEDI statement to ground our efforts.
(Released December 2023)