Last week, Elena Šiaudvytienė, instructor of LCC’s International Political Economy class, organized a World Climate Simulation for students. World Climate Simulation is an interactive role-play exercise on climate negotiation that explores the science and geopolitics of international agreements on climate change. It is grounded by a computer simulation of the dynamics of the climate system, C-ROADS, that influences the actual global negotiations. This simulation has been played by more than 62,000 participants from nearly a hundred countries worldwide. Students in the International Political Economy class were able to participate in this World Climate Simulation. They played the roles of negotiators for various nations or blocks of nations. Afterward, students had to consider their national interests as they negotiated a global agreement to mitigate climate change by committing to reduce Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the present through the year 2100. After the negotiations proposals were entered into the C-ROADS simulator which provided immediate feedback on the likely consequences, such as sea-level rise, GHG concentrations, and temperature outcomes.

During the debrief session, students reflected on their learning experience and shared insights from the Word Climate exercise. Many students shared that the simulation increased their awareness about the consequences of climate change and helped them to better understand the importance of taking responsibility and cooperating with others to address climate change issues.