Solutions Scholars Share Research Updates

Solution Scholars: Emon Sarker and Jason Xu, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science

Project Mentors: Ifeoma Adaji, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Science; Niyi Asiyanbi, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences 

Solutions Scholars Emon Sarker and Jason Xu showcased the progress made on a multi-platform digital tool to enhance wildfire preparedness across the country. Their final product will consist of both a website and mobile platform for users to access various tools and resources tailored to their unique needs. 

Users can personalize parameters within the tool, including by location and language preference through an onboarding survey. They can also communicate with a small, energy-efficient Language Learning Model to receive one-on-one personalized support, and can collaborate with their local community through an in-app social media feed. Users can also keep themselves accountable with a task and diary area. 

A key aspect of this project is the intentional curation of resources and tools that are incorporated into the platform, with the goal of addressing the potential distrust that can stem from overwhelming, confusing, and contradictory instructions available on the internet.  Resources that are carefully curated for accessibility, accuracy, and legitimacy avoid the potential for misinformation. 

On the backend, the tool uses surface temperature from open-source data to identify hotspots.  Evaluating the preparedness of communities using the tool against the geographic distribution of hotspots may allow the team to assess patterns in the future, with the goal of building better wildfire predictive models across the country.  Sarker and Xu are currently working on consolidating information across provinces in partnership with local and provincial fire preparedness services. 

Solutions Scholars: Jamie Stevens, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies; Estraven Lupino-Smith, Geography, Faculty of Arts

Project Mentors: Astrida Neimanis and Onyx Sloan Morgan, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences; Naomi Klein, Geography, Faculty of Arts

In their project, Solutions Scholars Jamie Stevens and Estraven Lupino-Smith focused on creative and arts-led approaches for meaningful climate justice action.  This project is grounded in the conviction that the central promise of climate justice—sustainable and meaningful lives for all current and future generations—is desired by all communities, but action moving towards this is hampered by a lack of opportunities to explore commonalities and hold tensions across difference.

They found that polarization in the context of anticolonial climate justice is about more than strict divisions across binary lines. It is intimately tied to power, equality, and justice. Using this as a guiding idea, the team gathered insights from sociology, anthropology, indigenous studies, environmental humanities, and adjacent disciplines to inform their approach to addressing polarization: storytelling. 

The team used storytelling as a method to address polarization through dialogue and are producing a series of short podcasts to share learnings gained through conversation.  The team has also hosted two workshops designed to both build the technical skills of participants who may choose podcasting or storytelling as a methodology, but also address ideas of communication and polarization to bring communities closer. 

The team plans to host more conversations in the coming months and have applied for further funding to deepen the dialogue and conversation. 

Solution Scholars: Theresa Dearden, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences; Blair Visscher, Faculty of Creative and Critical Studies

Project Mentors: Mary Stockdale and Jon Corbett, Irving K. Barber Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences;  Maged Senbel, Faculty of Applied Science

Solutions Scholars Theresa Dearden and Blair Visscher aimed to build the foundation for a Climate Engagement Centre (CEC) in Vernon, BC by combining insights from the UK’s Climate Emergency Center network with on-the-ground “deep canvassing” in the local community. The initiative seeks to bridge political and social divides that often exist in communities, including those who are experiencing the deep impacts of climate change. 

By assessing the UK’s existing network of over 30 CECs, the scholars identified a number of important best practices to consider for a similar centre in Vernon, BC.  The key learnings were to: start with community needs, not climate rhetoric; act as a connector, not a duplicator; provide flexibility and entry points for community members; and consider governance structures as these often impact the long-term sustainability of individual CECs.

In Vernon, local volunteers were trained to carry out “deep canvassing”, an approach that involves connecting with residents through door-to-door conversations.  These conversations prioritized personal storytelling and emotional resonance, focusing on listening rather than debating.  Trained canvassers asked open-ended questions about residents’ experiences with climate change and community resilience. Canvassers later participated in focus groups to debrief their experiences.  Across the neighbourhoods involved in the study, canvassers uncovered a genuine longing for community connection; residents indicated a desire for spaces to gather and work together, spaces where they can access trusted information. 

In the future, the team plans to translate the residents’ feedback into practical, welcoming programming at the Vernon CEC while prioritizing accessibility for youth, seniors, farmers, and families.

Solution Scholars: Hanan Awwad, Faculty of Applied Science; Ted Scott, Faculty of Arts

Project Mentors: Mohammad Shahrad, Faculty of Applied Science; Ivan Beschastnikh, Faculty of Science 

Solutions Scholars Hanan Awwad and Ted Scott conducted research to address carbon emissions generated by online services that typically run in the background of complex cloud computing environments and which rely on multiple interconnected systems. Without an end-to-end accounting of energy consumed through specific online services, it is challenging to attribute greenhouse gas emissions to a specific user or application, limiting both accountability and informed decision-making.

To address these challenges, Awwad and Scott developed a tool called “Firefly”, a lightweight, adaptable measurement system that tracks the exact energy usage of the distinct software components necessary to run an online service. 

When a user performs a simple action, such as typing a term into a search bar, or filtering a list of videos on a webpage, there are hidden computational steps occurring in the background. Firefly identifies each of these individual blocks of operation (such as parsing the query, searching the database, and returning the result to the user) and records both the execution time for each step and the energy consumed during that operation. To find the carbon footprint, Firefly takes the measured energy consumption and combines it with the carbon intensity of the fuel source powering the specific data center.

Because carbon intensity changes based on the local power grid, Firefly can reveal how the same digital action will yield entirely different levels of carbon emissions depending on the geographic location of the server processing that action.

Firefly makes it possible to generate accurate, real-time reports on carbon emissions, providing the opportunity for organizations to identify which system components use the most energy. 

Solutions Scholars: Adedayo Adeyanju, Faculty of Applied Science; Hayley Simpson, Faculty of Science

Project Mentors: Jiaying Zhao, Faculty of Arts and Faculty of Science; Rachel White, Faculty of Science

Solutions Scholars Adedayo Adeyanju and Hayley Simpson set out to answer a simple but crucial question: Does it actually matter how we talk about climate change? They explored whether the format used to communicate the severity of a heat wave impacts public concern and action. This question is important because an individual's level of concern is a direct precursor to behavioural change, climate mitigation action, and support for climate policies.

Adeyanju and Simpson presented a case study showcasing the devastating heat dome in BC in 2021 as their primary anchor point to study how severe weather is communicated. The study tested three statistically identical but distinct ways that journalists and scientists frame extreme climate data: frequency, likelihood, and temperature.

• Frequency framing refers to describing the event by how often it occurs (e.g., a “1-in-1000-year” event).
• Likelihood framing refers to describing an event using probability and percentages.
• Temperature framing refers to describing the event strictly using temperature readings.

The researchers used an online survey to capture the baseline concern levels of respondents to heat waves. Participants were shown pictures and information that represented either (a) “moderate” or (b) “severe” heat wave conditions. Participants were then asked to answer questions and indicate their level of concern based on three different communication formats (frequency, likelihood, and temperature).

The study found that the format in which the information was presented, changed the respondent’s estimates and levels of concern.  In other words, scientifically identical statements had different psychological impacts on respondents. This finding has important implications on the effectiveness of climate communication.  The research term has a journal publication in preparation to share their detailed findings. 

Solutions Scholars: Balraj Rathod and Mahfida Tahniat, Faculty of Education

Project Mentors: Sandra Scott and Douglas Adler, Faculty of Education; Kshamta Hunter, UBC Sustainability

Solutions Scholars Balraj Rathod and Mahfida Tahniat assessed how a climate justice cohort could be included in future teacher education programs, specifically at UBC.  Their project aims to create a formalized specialization within the 11-month elementary Bachelor of Education program, equipping future teachers to effectively and confidently teach climate justice. 

Phase 1 of this research involved a literature review and an investigation into what other academic programs are currently offering regarding climate change and climate justice.  They found that, while there are individual courses or professional development opportunities, there are currently no teacher education programs in Canada that offer a specific, formalized cohort focused on climate justice or climate change.

In Phase 2 of this research, the scholars took a mixed-methods approach to assess the needs of educators. They conducted both surveys and in-depth interviews with teachers to understand how they currently approach teaching climate justice in the classroom. A critical finding from the needs assessment was that the majority of teachers reported feeling only “somewhat confident” when it comes to teaching about climate change. This assessment also revealed that while teachers want to engage with these topics, they have insufficient time to create comprehensive resources from scratch. 

The Solutions Scholars addressed the common misconception that elementary-aged children might be too young for heavy topics like the climate crisis. They countered this misconception by noting that children are already living through these realities such as experiencing extreme weather and the tangible inequities of climate justice (e.g., families being unable to afford a heat pump or air conditioning).

The needs assessment highlighted that teachers expressed a strong desire to integrate climate justice across multiple subjects and take climate learning outside of the traditional classroom setting. They requested resources that involve films, citizen science, family engagement, and moral advocacy.