Call for Submissions
About Earthrise Commons
Earthrise Commons will serve as a digital resource companion to our Open Access book, featuring projects that highlight how sustainability education and community engagement are being integrated into courses, programs, and community initiatives worldwide. These submissions will celebrate diverse approaches to sustainability education and offer actionable insights and models that can be adapted by other institutions and communities to enhance learner engagement, equity, and impact.
Selected submissions are a form of publishing that you can use to build community, advance ideas, and sprinkle some sustainability learning and community engagement into your teaching, no matter your field of study.
Why Contribute?
By sharing your work, you will:
- Join a local and global community of sustainability educators and practitioners
- Contribute to open educational resources for sustainability action
- Connect with peers through our collaborative webinar series
- Help build a more sustainable and equitable future
We’re transforming a forthcoming anthology, Sustainability Learning for Action & Community Engagement (Palgrave Macmillan SpringerNature), into a living sustainability education platform called the Earthrise Commons. This Open Education Resource will provide educators worldwide (high school through college undergraduate) with free, accessible, adaptable, and shareable content to support sustainability education and action.
The platform will include:
- A Creative Commons License:
- CC-BY-NC
- CC-BY-SA
- CC-BY
- Original book chapters via SpringerLink (with metrics)
- Lesson plans that educators can modify
- Interactive resources and videos
- A toolbox of sustainability competencies and frameworks
- Student work examples (with permission)
The project uses an open-source infrastructure, managed by a team of curators at SUNY New Paltz, U.S. The design prioritizes search ability, follows UN Global Goals taxonomies, and supports Universal Design for Learning principles. This approach activates sustainability education in a collaborative, interdisciplinary learning space where knowledge can be shared and built upon by the community.
Each submission may also include:
- A personal bio page (optional, this can be as short as two lines)
On your bio page, you may provide:
- Links to more resources
- An indication that you’re open to being contacted about the project
- An email contact method
How to Contribute
Option 1: Complete the Google Form
Please fill out as much of the provided form as you can to submit your contribution.
Google Form SubmissionOption 2: Submit a Google Doc
If you prefer, you may submit your response via a Google Doc. You can simply upload whatever materials you already have without needing to reformat them or answer new questions.
- Create your document
- Upload it to the Earthrise Commons Submissions Google Drive folder.
Submission Guidelines
We welcome submissions that address innovative and impactful sustainability initiatives across social, environmental, and economic dimensions.
Submissions should include:
- Overview: A general description of the initiative, including its purpose and context within sustainability’s multiple dimensions
- Case Study: A detailed example illustrating how the initiative was implemented and its outcomes
- Equity and Access: How the initiative addresses human flourishing and access for diverse populations
- Impacts: Share any assessment or desired outcomes of this approach
- Adaptability: Guidance for how the approach can be tailored to other contexts, communities, or learning environments
- Additional Resources: Any tools, frameworks, or materials that support design and implementation
Your submission should consider:
- Community Access: How your project enables equitable participation
- Potential Barriers: Solutions for overcoming obstacles to participation
- Allocating Resources: Costs and funding strategies
- Knowledge Sharing: Training and preparing participants
Suggested Topics
Submissions may focus on (but are not limited to) the following areas:
- Integrating the UN Sustainable Development Goals
- Climate change challenges and solutions
- Biodiversity and ecosystem restoration
- Mental health and climate anxiety
- Community building and depolarization
- Inner dimensions of sustainability
- Project-Based Learning or Service Learning approaches
- Community partnerships and resilience building
- Social justice initiatives that bridge access gaps
- Measuring social and environmental impact
- Youth-led initiatives
- Sustainability competencies development
- Pollution and waste reduction
- Regenerative practices
Lesson Plan Format Options
You may submit your Lesson Plan and Resources in whatever format you created them, to minimize the amount of work you need to do and to show a diversity of approaches to our community.
However, if feasible, viable, and desirable, we encourage including a lesson plan using the Understanding by Design (UbD) framework. Please use the following format, based on this template that you can copy from Google Docs.
Google Docs Template Stage 1 - Big Ideas & Essential Questions
| Component | Description |
|---|---|
| Established Goal(s)/Content Standard(s) | What relevant goals/standards will this design address? |
| Understanding(s) | Students will understand that:
|
| Essential Question(s) |
|
| Student Objectives (Outcomes) | Students will be able to:
|
Stage 2 - Learning Activities
| Component | Description |
|---|---|
| Performance Task(s) | Through what authentic performance tasks will students demonstrate understanding? By what criteria will “performances of understanding” be judged? Consider including:
|
| Other Evidence | What other evidence will show student achievement? Include pre-assessment, formative, and summative assessments — both formal and informal.
|
Stage 3 - Performance Tasks & Evidence of Learning
| Element | Description |
|---|---|
| Where | How does the lesson establish where the unit is going and what is expected?
|
| Hook | How will you hook and hold student interest?
|
| Equip | How will you equip students with needed experiences, tools, knowledge, and know-how?
|
| Rethink | How will students rethink and revise their understandings and work?
|
| Evaluate | How will students evaluate their work and its implications? |
Call for Submissions: SUNY FACT2 Experiential Learning Playbook
This project call for proposals was adapted from the Experiential Learning Playbook by the Faculty Advisory Council on Teaching and Technology (FACT2) which was shared with a Creative Commons Attribution License (CC-BY-NC). Please find the Call for Submissions for the SUNY FACT2 Experiential Playbook below.
SUNY FACT2 Call for Submissions