As a newly-appointed Circle U. Student Fellow at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, I took the opportunity to participate in the European university alliance’s inaugural public Climate Day. Together with other students, researchers and activists from Circle U.’s nine partner universities, I attended a wide-ranging programme: a webinar, a panel discussion, and a fishbowl session. Here, I share my impressions and takeaways on how listening to the land through locally-informed and grounded practices can mitigate the impact of complex global challenges.
Listening to locals: one tree and 1,000 weather stations
I started the day getting acquainted with Ulmus laevis, a climate expert in the form of a European White Elm tree, in a video introduction by Marcel Robischon (Academic Director and Professor of Agroecology, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin). Although trees are an oft-overlooked part of sprawling university campuses, I appreciated how Robischon zoomed in on this particular tree as an example of the non-human witnesses of climate change and the stories they tell. In some ways, Ulmus laevis symbolizes how plant life bears evidence of the affinities and divergent ways in which our hyper-local contexts experience climate change.
Attending a webinar hosted by UCLouvain, I found it inspiring to learn about the potential global impact of leveraging localized contexts. In “Citizen Science: Rethinking Research with and for Society,” Annelies Duerinckx (Coordinator, Scivil – Citizen Science Flanders) cited meteorology apps as an example of citizen participation, highlighting the power of a global network of 10,000 personal weather stations located in private gardens. Beyond data collection and analysis, Duerinckx demonstrated how citizens can be more involved in scientific processes through local observation of familiar contexts and formulating novel research questions.
From micro-insights to effective strategies
This aligns with ideas put forth by other speakers throughout the day—Muki Haklay (Université de Paris-Cité, University College London, European Citizen Science Association) invoked the words of former Executive Director of the European Environment Agency Prof. Jacqueline McGlade: “Often the best information comes from those who are closest to it, and it is important we harness this local knowledge if we are to tackle climate change adequately.” Similarly, Samira Ghandour (Activist, Fridays For Future) reinforced the need to connect global goals with local efforts, making climate action tangible in one’s own neighbourhood in a panel hosted by Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin.
Overall, listening to the diverse voices of climate experts such as Ulmus laevis, a Flemish meteorologist, a geographer based between London and Paris, and a Berlin-based activist allowed me to encounter concrete examples of how situated approaches can offer tools, strategies and learnings across wider ecologies.
Another significant takeaway was the need to engage with climate injustice more critically – in particular the exclusion of indigenous knowledge systems and the power imbalances between Europe and the Global South, which might be disproportionately affected and inadequately equipped to handle the impact of climate change. As a student researcher working with community-based methods in Berlin, this event allowed me to better envisage how micro-level insights can be translated into broader strategies, strengthening novel perspectives and transdisciplinary innovations across regional and international networks.
