Why Astronomy 101 is ‘perfect’ for teaching climate change

Introduction to Astronomy is a college class usually filled with excitement and a lot of questions about outer space. Questions like: What are black holes? Are there planets out there that are habitable? Why is Venus’s climate so different from Earth’s even though the planets started out so similar?
It’s perhaps because of this that the course lends itself to discussing the realities of climate change here on Earth.
It also might be the last science class that non-STEM majors will take – their last chance to learn the science to understand global warming. “That’s part of the reason why we’re motivated to teach climate change in our courses,” says
, a professor of astronomy at the University of Alaska Anchorage.
Rector is one of the founders of
, an organization of over 2000 educators teaching people about climate change through astronomy.
This combination makes sense to fellow astronomer
, who has taken one of Rector’s workshops aimed at educators.
“Because [as] astronomers, we are painfully aware that we have no Planet B,” Madrid says, “That our planet is the only planet, the only body on the solar system, that can sustain our species.”
Madrid is a professor at the University of Texas Rio Grande Valley. He says when the topic of climate change would come up in his class, silence would consume the room. When he probed further, like about how greenhouse gases are produced, he got answers like, “Because we use a lot of nail polish.”
So, he began connecting astronomy concepts to climate change. Like how visible light gets trapped in your car and heats it up on a hot summer day.
is how greenhouse gases act: Gases like carbon dioxide, water vapor and methane trap heat in Earth’s atmosphere by radiating the heat back to Earth’s surface, warming it like a planet-sized car.
But the lessons in Rector and Madrid’s classrooms don’t stop at the stark realities of climate change. They also empower students, discussing the power they have as to change the path we are on.
“I think that’s a very important role that we can serve in helping people transition from just fear and shame to action and optimism,” says Rector.
And that sense of empowerment and optimism has, in turn, inspired Madrid. “I do have hope about all this,” he says. “But I can only have hope when I know that my students and the future generations are well-trained and understand well our challenges ahead.”