20 Things You Can Do to Help Beat Plastic Pollution

In March 2022, the UN Environmental Assembly gathered in Nairobi, Kenya, and 175 nations agreed to develop an international, legally binding agreement by the end of 2024 to end plastic pollution. Spurred on in part by the growing global awareness of the catastrophic impact that plastic waste is having on the environment, especially the oceans, this historic day also highlighted the importance of us rapidly shifting to a circular economy.

With the UN’s agreement set to come into effect at the end of this year and this year’s Earth Day theme being  Planet vs Plastics, we are sharing 20 actions that anyone, anywhere can take to help tackle plastic pollution. 

This is a complex topic, one I have written about in the past. I’ve explored how recycling is broken and asked, Will Global Plastic Bans Work? 

In 2018 we launched a campaign for a post-disposable future, as one of the main drivers of plastic waste has been the rapid transition from reusable to disposable items in everything from food service ware to sanitary items.

The big changes we need to see will take all of us contributing in different ways, and one person’s actions can help make a difference, especially if those actions help create a movement.

If you want to see more everyday actions you can take to make a positive impact, check out the UN collaboration we did called the Anatomy of Action. 

20 WAYS to beat plastic pollution

SWAPS:  Opt for reusable as often as possible and get creative with trading in your local community

• Swap from single-use to reusable: This can be done across many areas, from how you get water when you’re out and about to what you choose for your office lunch. Swapping out a single-use to reusable can include bringing your own container or vessel, or finding the time and place to use the reusable options provided. 

• Rethink food storage: Eliminate plastic baggies and wrap by swapping to reusable containers and beeswax wraps to store food at home. 

• Ditch single-use period products and opt for new reusable ones: The silicone cups are life-changing! Reusable for years and very effective to use, one cup can save thousands of tampons from being used. The many new period underwear products are also helping save women money and reducing a bunch of plastic, so check out what’s on offer for you and switch out the plastic in your monthly cycle. 

• Have a clothing swap with friends! Not only will you save your old clothes from the landfill, but you'll also get new outfits for free and have some fun social time. Many clothes are filled with plastic, so in general, try to always opt for second-hand or locally designed and made garments. 

• Find some freecycle or like-minded communities in your area: Depending on your city, these swap-based communities trade goods and services with the caveat that it’s free. 

SERVICES: Utilize services that are designed for and support the circular economy

• Use a clothing or tool library: If you have these in your city, you can borrow, rent or lease anything from drills and exercise equipment to a fancy outfit you only need for one night. 

• Food waste delivery services: Many cities have companies that save food from waste (usually due to overstock or minor aesthetic issues), and you can often get a lot of great produce and meals at a discounted price. Check out the Too Good to Go App to see if it’s active in your area. 

• Subscribe to a low-packaging service: This is common now for things like personal care and cleaning products; they often come in tablet form so you are not paying for all that water, and you can use the tablet in a reusable bottle. 

• Compost! If you don’t have space at your home, your neighborhood or city collection might have a green waste pickup service. Many places have community gardens that will accept it as well. You can buy small-scale worm farms to have mess-free, odor-free vermicompost right in your home, which takes up a very small footprint.

• If you have a little one, look for a nappy/diaper washing service: These product-service-system models will lease you the clean reusable diapers and take away and bulk wash the dirty ones (this is key to making them more sustainable, as the bulk washing saves water and energy).

STAY CREATIVE: Embrace DIY & activated agency by making your own items and speaking up in support of preventing plastic waste.

• Make your own! This is a great solution for many household cleaning products and food items like non-dairy milks (almond and oat milk are very quick and easy to make — check out out Hero Veg Cookbook for recipes on how to make these!).  You can even make your own deodorant, toothpaste, lip gloss, eyeliner and many other items with a few basic materials, and the internet has tons of instructions on how to do these. 

• Take your own: A simple but powerful option is to ask a shop to fill your own vessel when getting takeout or to-go food. You may get rejected, but it's worth asking and raising awareness of this need. Lots of really cool reusable food container services are popping up all over the world, and they might already be in your community! Check out the Dabba Drop in London as an example. 

• Actively refuse single-use items when offered and make a point as to why: This could be when you are in a sit-down cafe and they bring you a drink in a disposable plastic cup; when ordering, check first what the item will come in and make sure to ask for a reusable option.

• Don't be afraid to ask: Be it at your local cafe or your kids' school, ask for reusable options and explain why. The more people who request this, the more likely it is to become normalized and adopted.

• Know your local recycling options and optimize for them: Most places still don't accept soft plastics, but every local waste service is different. Do a quick Google search to learn about your local pick-up and recycling options, and when you’re shopping, select items that can easily be recaptured.

SHOP SMARTER: Be extra choosy about where and how you spend your consumer power

• Seek out zero waste shopping solutions: For example, the ZeroWasteStore app enables you to get pantry items without the plastic. 

• Buy bigger: Another great option for pantries, especially when it comes to soft plastic for household staples like rice, is to look for bulk options that will reduce the amount of plastic you purchase. This often saves you money as well when you buy in bulk, seek out specialty stores that offer bulk purchasing. 

• Support shops and stores that are offering zero waste and plastic-free shopping: The key is to reuse packaging, not just swap to a different type of material that is disposable. So find stores that are actively reducing their plastic use and support them — it makes a difference! 

• Find a local farmer to shop from: Many communities have farmer subscription services where a box of farm fresh food can be delivered to your home plastic-free. This will not only save you money and reduce the amount of plastic you get on your fruit and veg, but it also helps support local farmers (who are heroes in my mind).

• Invest in start-ups and services that are creating post-disposable products and services: The best way to see more services available is to invest in them, and early adopters can often bear the financial load. But if you can’t afford it, and want to see more of it, then seek out and invest (by becoming a customer) in zero waste and sustainable services.

HUNGRY FOR MORE?

If you want to explore more things you can do, explore circular business models in our free Circular Business ReDesign Kit, download our free Superpower Activation Kit, or take on a post-disposable design challenge by downloading our free Post-Disposable Kit. 

The UnSchool also offers a lot of free content, email micro courses, professional programs and accredited online certification tracks to help you be a more activated participant in solving global social and environmental issues.

The Rising Peak of Climate and Eco-Anxiety

This is Part 1 of a 3 part series on this topic by Leyla Acaroglu

Have you ever felt overwhelmed or even depressed by the global climate and nature crises?

I know I have. Despite having a very optimistic future-focused perspective, I can often feel distressed by the constant compounding disasters; floods, fires, famine — the consequences of our nature-destructive tendencies are all over the news and often present in our daily lives.

Now moreso than ever, these issues are being directly attributed to climate change, which reinforces the need for action. But when you don’t see the action happening, it can create an even deeper sense of anxiety and despair.

The resulting stress and pessimism felt by the awareness of environmental issues is called climate or eco-anxiety, and we recently took some time to look into the science behind this. What we found was really concerning. This appears to be widespread with the emotional and psychological toll of inaction affecting people’s mental health, life choices and productivity across all age groups.

I wanted to share some of the high-level things we learned through our research, which also prompted us to create a survey about eco-anxiety to understand more about how this is affecting people in our community so we can develop some creative change-making tools to support people experiencing this. If you have a few moments to spare, please take it ⬇️

Over the next couple of months I will share a series of articles on what we have found out, report on what you share with us via the survey, and develop a toolkit for tackling this issue in a creative way.

Get the Toolkit

Sign up to be the first notified when the Eco-Anxiety Toolkit is ready.

Subscribe

We respect your privacy. Your information will only be used to send you the information you are signing up for.

What’s going on?

Climate-related emotions are becoming more prevalent as the awareness of the severity and the urgency to act on climate change has become more mainstream.

There has been an increase in the number of people expressing their experience of negative emotions, such as climate anxiety and distress about the future, as a result.

The concept of anxiety brought about as a result of experiencing environmental issues was first mentioned in the general media in the 90s to address citizen concerns about pollution in the Chesapeake Bay in the US. It started gaining more mainstream discussion in 2007, with the work of individual scholars like the Australian environmental philosopher Glenn Albrecht leading the conversation into the early 2010s.

However, eco-anxiety did not begin to garner as much widespread attention and research as we see today until 2017 when the American Psychological Association partnered with ecoAmerica and Climate for Health to deliver the report Mental Health and Our Changing Climate: Impacts, Implications, and Guidance.

This report delivered a working definition of eco-anxiety as “a chronic fear of environmental doom.” This identified a host of emotional and physiological experiences ranging from anxiety and depression to fear and “doomism” as part of the suite of emotional states felt by people in response to environmental disasters and threats. The report points out “that uncertainty, unpredictability, and uncontrollability seem to be important factors in eco-anxiety. Most forms of eco-anxiety appear to be non-clinical, but cases of ‘pathological’ eco-anxiety are also discussed.”

Despite this increase in research and mainstream discourse, climate or eco-anxiety is still widely misunderstood as a concept, with this 2021 systematic literature review concluding:

“Eco-anxiety is a concept used for understanding the link between climate change and anxiety associated with perceptions about the negative impacts of climate change. The evidence suggests that further clarity and theoretical development of the concept is required to advance conceptual understanding of eco-anxiety. Our review also showed that most of the evidence comes from the Western countries, and more research is needed in other parts of the world. Indigenous peoples, children and young people are identified as vulnerable where their lived experiences of eco-anxiety are unclear and require further research.” — Understanding Eco-anxiety: A Systematic Scoping Review of Current Literature and Identified Knowledge Gaps

Meanwhile, as academia works to come to a consensus and further develop an understanding of eco-anxiety, those who experience and live with the effects are left to navigate it with limited support while it impacts their daily functioning, life decisions, perspective of the future and productivity at work.

The Lived Experience

We live in an information overload age whereby it’s hard to switch off from content that can cause all sorts of distress and anxiety. But when you combine this with the lived experience of changing weather, fires, floods, the increased severity of weather events like cyclones and hurricanes, when you witness firsthand the devastation that environmental disasters, deforestation, and chronic air pollution have, the effects can be visceral and confronting.

Some of the emotional responses to these experiences are anger, fear, frustration, hopelessness, avoidance, anxiety, depression, lack of energy and guilt or shame. These can lead to sleeplessness, changes to appetite and difficulty concentrating.

Have you experienced any of these effects? Some people who struggle with eco-anxiety have reported difficulty with concentrating at work and can’t decide if they want to have a family with the potential for a climate-ravaged future. In an interesting juxtaposition, some share that they avoid absorbing any media that reminds them of the impending climate doom, while others sometimes even seek it out in what’s been called “doom scrolling.”

I’ve worked in sustainability for over 20 years, and I absolutely choose to switch off to avoid certain portrayals of climate change. I’ve long felt that the negativity framing doesn’t work to engage people, as I myself become riddled with fear, which makes me shut down. It certainly doesn’t inspire creativity or action.

Understanding eco-anxiety has the potential to shed light on a range of eco-emotions that reflect our interconnectedness with all life and systems on Earth. Eco-emotions can illuminate our relational ties, encourage us to reflect on what we truly value, and remind us of our fundamental dependency on complex ecological systems so we are moved to protect and nurture the Earth.

So perhaps the fact that so many people are feeling some sort of pain associated with the crises in nature demonstrates the deep interconnection that we humans have with the natural world and innate desire to resolve this. And these feelings can be transformed from a negative ones of loss to proactive action.

Let’s dive into how the definition of eco-anxiety has come to spread across three distinct contexts and how it’s affecting us.

The Contexts of Eco-Anxiety

There are numerous definitions of eco-anxiety that have emerged as the arena has gained more researchers focusing on it. There are inconsistencies in the use of the term and debate in the medical community around its definition. Still, there is a consensus that eco-anxiety is fueled by uncertainty and uncontrollability (similar to other anxiety disorders).

The two commonly cited definitions include the APA’s 2017 version previously mentioned, “a chronic fear of environmental doom,” and The Climate Psychology Alliance’s version: “heightened emotional, mental or somatic distress in response to dangerous changes in the climate system,” in which somatic refers to the physical embodiment of stress.

“The grief felt in relation to experienced or anticipated ecological losses, including the loss of species, ecosystems and meaningful landscapes due to acute or chronic environmental change. We contend that ecological grief is a natural response to ecological losses, particularly for people who retain close living, working and cultural relationships to the natural environment, and one that has the potential to be felt more strongly and by a growing number of people as we move deeper into the Anthropocene.” Cunsolo, A. & Ellis, N.

Professor Albrecht, who has been at the forefront of this research, suggests that chronic stress on ecosystems is likely to result in “psychoterratic” or Earth-related mental health syndromes, including eco-angst, eco-nostalgia, solastalgia, eco-guilt, eco-paralysis, ecological grief and environmental distress.

But this is not a one-size-fits-all situation. The context in which the person experiencing the emotions lives, the threats they experience directly or indirectly and their socio-economic situation will all affect the way eco-anxiety is experienced (a systems thinking perspective can greatly assist in better understanding these nuances).

For example, a person living in a climate-affected area will have a very different threat level than a person living in an area that has not yet experienced any significant climate-related impacts. There is also the issue of climate injustice, where young people are likely to experience the greatest mental burden from climate change that older generations have caused and where countries that have not benefited from the rapid industrial growth of the West suffer the worst of the climate and nature crises.

How is this experienced?

The human brain is wired to respond to threats. As humans we have negativity and optimism biases that help us hone in on threats that may negatively impact our ability to survive, and conversely, have the ability to imagine a positive future for ourselves so that we can still function in everyday life (check out our course on Cognitive Science and Biases to learn more about this).

The research indicates there are loosely three climate-related contexts for “ecological grief”, which is a subset of eco-anxiety:

1. Grief associated with physical ecological losses: Refers to anxiety from the physical disappearance or degradation of species, ecosystems and landscapes, which can emerge due to gradual changes over time. This is also sometimes referred to as “slow violence,” in which harmful impacts play out over the course of many years or decades.

2. Grief associated with the loss of environmental knowledge and identity: Refers to the grief experienced by those who have strong relational ties to the natural world and whose personal and collective understandings of identity are created in relation to the land (this is often referenced by Indigenous groups and identified as a core grief in the fight to communicate this to non-Indigenous peoples).

3. Grief associated with the anticipated future losses: Refers to the future and anticipated losses to culture, livelihoods, and ways of life based on the changes already experienced and those projected to occur.

These three contexts can be felt both simultaneously and on a spectrum. For instance, someone who has experienced a climate-related disaster can be anxious about the physical losses of their local environment while also being worried about the future anticipated losses.

The symptoms of eco-anxiety

Many of the symptoms of eco-anxiety are similar to that of general anxiety disorder. Like all emotions, the symptoms and their intensity can range and are influenced by personality traits, cultural notions of value (i.e. a greater value attributed to ecological loss can result in greater climate anxiety), and personal experiences (e.g. experiences of climate-related disasters).

Research into other eco-emotions is emerging and reveals the complex and often competing feelings that fluctuate and can occur simultaneously.

It’s not specifically anxiety that people feel; in fact, the research states that people have a constellation of emotions with common symptoms of eco-anxiety including:

• Worry

• Fear

• Anger or frustration (e.g. due to the inaction of governments, large organizations and industries; self-directed anger; anger as a result of concern for younger generations and feeling unable to to cause systemic change)

• Grief

• Shame and guilt (i.e. their environmental impact or lack of effort in the past)

• Irritability

• Hopelessness/ powerlessness

• Existential dread/ fatalistic thinking

• Obsessive thoughts about climate change

• Depression and sadness

• Shock

• Stupor

• Overwhelm

• Stress

• Physical impacts include: headaches, stomach aches, chest pain, sleeplessness/insomnia, panic attacks, loss of appetite

Experiencing intense feelings of eco-anxiety or being a survivor of climate-related disasters can lead to a state of eco-paralysis that manifests as apathy or fatalistic thinking, PTSD, suicidal ideation, and maladaptive coping strategies like substance misuse.

Furthermore, research is beginning to uncover complex forms of climate anxiety and trauma and their intergenerational effects, such as when environmental damage causes the loss of personal or cultural identity, ways of life and knowing. For Indigenous and First Nations People, this is a deeply embodied experience whereby the loss of nature, land and culture is deeply connected to the colonial severing and stealing that led to the nature-disconnect we live in today (where we moved from human-nature relations that were based on reciprocity to one of dominance and exploitation that has fueled the eco-crises we face). So, in this case, the term eco-anxiety could be seen as a privileged position connected to the difference between those who can afford to feel anxiety about the situation versus those who are living the losses in real time.

It’s important not to dismiss that positive emotions can also result from eco-anxiety, particularly when the feelings are acknowledged and navigated effectively. They can be a source of motivation for active engagement, hope, resilience, empowerment, and connection, particularly when participating in co-designing initiatives for collective action. The negative feelings are often the stated motivation for people getting involved in taking action, from tech solutions, young activists through to CEOs deciding to make the needed changes to their businesses.

This is often where the hope lies, in being able to feel through the complex emotional states that fear and grief generate for us and transitioning these from paralysis to action. Or at the very least, having a collective dialogue about the felt realities so those experiencing them don’t suffer in silence.

We are eager to understand more about these experiences so that we can develop an action-oriented toolkit to support people experiencing eco-anxiety — which is why we developed a survey to capture people’s thoughts, experiences and emotions about eco-anxiety.

Our survey is designed to help you reflect on these experiences as much as help us understand more about how people are navigating eco-anxiety. The science on how to address climate anxiety is out there, so please help us in creating a tool for making change by taking the survey.

In the next part of this series, I will dive further into how eco-anxiety is currently impacting citizens across the globe, so stay tuned for more.

If you need support, please contact your local mental health support service, there is a global list provided here, or seek support from a qualified healthcare professional. Additionally, the Climate Council offers these resources.

Activating your Systems Thinking Superpower

Did you know that ​thinking about the full system of chocolate chip cookies​ gave Dr. Leyla Acaroglu the inspiration to start The UnSchool? It’s true!

We believe 110% that thinking in systems is a critical tool for positive change, and in this journal post, we’re excited to dive further into the superpower that is systems thinking!

What is Systems Thinking?

Systems thinking is the ability to see the whole before the parts, and it's fundamental to the ​Disruptive Design Method​.

The world is full of big messy complex social, political, and environmental problems, which are all part of bigger systems at play. In order to help disrupt the underlying issues, we need to first understood what is going on.

From ​climate change​ to the rise in racism, homelessness, child exploitation, global politics and ocean plastic waste, these problems are all part of complex interconnected systems.

Taking ​a systems approach ​enables you to develop a more dynamic and intimate understanding of the elements and agents at play within the problem arena, so you can identify ​opportunities for intervention​.

This is our simple 6-step flow to making change from a systems standpoint

Tools such as ​systems mapping​ are critical to overcoming the reductive mindset we were all taught in school — a mindset that teaches us to break the world down into individual and manageable parts, rather than see the complex, interconnected whole. (Leyla wrote more ​about the education systems failures here​, if you want to dive in!)

From Linear to Circular

Reductive thinking is what has led to the exploitative economy. In order to get to a ​circular economy​, we need systems thinking.

“Problems are just unaddressed opportunities waiting for creative minds to tackle them. ”

— Leyla Acaroglu

By taking a systems approach, we can each undo the linear and rigid mindsets that helped create the problems to begin with.

Thankfully, humans naturally have a curious and intuitive understanding of ​complex, dynamic, and interconnected systems​. So, it’s really not that hard to rewire our thinking systems from linear to expanded, from 1-dimensional to 3-dimensional thinking.

UnSchool Kuching Fellowship participants engage in a​ systems mapping ​exercise during one of their sessions

Our​ Systems Thinking online course​ is one of our most popular classes for a reason: systems thinking is a superpower that anyone can access to make change.

We also have a handy 10 Day Email Micro Course, Systems Thinking 101, that is just $19 USD and is the perfect entry point for anyone beginning their systems journey!

If you've already taken our Systems Thinking course, or have expertise in this area, then take a look at our advanced​ Systems Interventions course​ to learn to see critical relationships, understand feedback loops, and conduct consequence analyses. You will also establish causal relationships and gain radical insights into ​systems dynamics​.

Want more change-making superpowers? Download our free ​Superpower Activation Toolkit​ for others like Problem Loving, Future Focus and more!

Questions or suggestions? Reach out to us via programs@unschools.co

A New Way to UnLearn: Introducing 10 day email micro courses

This is hard for us to believe, but… we have been building courses for people to advance their skills in systems, sustainability, and design for a decade this year!

In working with so many incredible creative change-makers around the world through the past 10 years, we know that people learn in different ways and have different accessibility considerations for investing in upskilling.

With the undeniable need for as many change-makers activated as possible right now, one of our goals is to always find new approaches to delivering content that supports personal and professional transformation.

As such, The UnSchool is now offering 10-Day Email Micro Courses that are packed with activities and knowledge, sent directly to your inbox, for just $19 USD!

Choose from:

Agency & Activation 💥

Co-Design 🤝

Systems Thinking 101 🌐

We currently have 3 different Micro Courses to choose from:

• Agency & Activation 💥 Need a fast track to get shit done, take action and move your change-making initiatives forward? Here it is.

• Co-Design 🤝 Want a road map to equitable engagement, better collabs & improved design outcomes? You found it!

• Systems Thinking 101 🌐 Ready to get your feet wet with all things systems to make positive change? Think of this like Systems Thinking 101.

If you’re a busy professional with limited time but you’re keen to learn how to make change, this is the perfect format for you! You'll also have access to the course material as long as you need so you can refer back to it as you build your change-making skills. Perks include:

• Convenient delivery: All course material goes straight to your inbox through a daily email for 10 days

• Accessible, robust material: Written in a format that's easy to digest and apply, you'll get videos, downloadable worksheets & extra resources along the way

• Efficient daily practice: Expect to budget just 10-20 minutes daily to read and do the mind-boosting activities

Questions or suggestions? Reach out to us via programs@unschools.co

Enjoy!

Alumni Becky Querido: Curating Systems Change experiences

Can you give us an introduction to yourself and your work?

I am a collaborative and creative Learning & Leadership Development professional that enables people to discover, experience and explore their potential, and cultivates in them positive lasting change. I utilize my strengths in connecting people, ideas and perspectives, creatively conveying vision and concepts, and finding opportunity in complexity in pursuit of growth and transformation.

I find powerful dynamic ways for people to interact with content to turn information into insight and knowledge into experience. My passion for cultivating learning in others has evolved in my 20 years of practice in human resources, change management, and project management. This combination of experience has given me a unique gift in curating powerful learning experiences. My work has included designing change and learning programs and systems for higher education, healthcare and utilities organizations.

What motivates you to do the work that you do?

I am motivated by inspiring others to live a more enriching life that minimizes our environmental impact, and by helping people move from survival mode to thriving in their work and personal lives. My mission is to activate agency in others to be a force for regenerative leadership and renovate their workplaces, lifestyles and communities in sustainable ways.

How did you find out about the UnSchool, and what motivated you to come?

I discovered and started following Unschool in 2019 and was inspired by how the message of positive system disruption. I was curious to learn more about design thinking and how to apply systems thinking to make a difference to our global environmental challenges. (UnSchool team note: Becky completed our online Practitioner Certification Track!)

What was your experience at the UnSchool like?

Being an independent learner was difficult but I really connected with Leyla’s message and some of the concepts, such as gamification and social change theory. While it took me longer to complete than planned, I enjoyed the challenges which pushed me outside of my comfort zone and into taking action.  

What was the main take away you had from coming to the UnSchool?

The most important thing I can do is to take action. I have all the knowledge I need to act, and just need to put myself out there, have fun, and continue prototyping.

Tell us more about your initiative(s), and how is it all going?

I plan to continue to do workshops and bring people together to make micro changes to their daily home and workplace practices to think and act differently about their consumption and disposal choices.

How did the UnSchool help you start/evolve it?

The points challenges were key to getting me out of planning and into acting. The reflections and exercises helped me to generate ideas that got me motivated and ready for action. 

How have you amplified this change you do in the world?

My neighbours and friends have been influenced and impacted by my projects. They have integrated small changes into their lives to conserve resources. 

How can people engage with, support, or follow your work?

Website → www.querida.ca

LinkedIn → Becky Querido

Alumni Julie Beretta: Creating Space

Can you give us an introduction to yourself and your work?

Hello! I’m Julie, a yoga teacher, sustainability consultant, and writer (@thesustainablemag, @dinnerconfidential and I just completed my first book). With French-American origins, I was raised in Italy, but after spending several years working abroad and volunteering around the world on different projects tied to sustainability, I moved back to Rome in 2020, right before the pandemic hit.  

Craving deeper talks, I became an active member of Dinner Confidential, where I facilitate monthly conversations around taboo topics through vulnerability and active listening. This feeds my passion for human relations, which also led me to get trained in the 7 steps and enroll in Gabor Maté’s Compassionate Inquiry approach. Using these tools, I help people uncover the unconscious dynamics that run their lives and prepare them for difficult conversations with themselves and others.

All of the pieces of my work come together for me in my personal project, We Bloom (I plan to launch my website at the beginning of November). With this, my purpose is to create spaces for us to reconnect to our essence, communities and environment.

What words, sensations and feelings arise when you think of sustainability? We started our introspective journey with a breathing exercise and then each shared our answers in this space free of judgement. The COVID restrictions only allowed for 6 people to take part and that actually made this moment intimate and memorable - photo taken in October 2020 In Sabina, Italy.

What motivates you to do the work that you do?

From a technological standpoint, we’ve never been as wired as we are now. Yet I often have the feeling that we are more disconnected than ever before; from our true selves, from our bodies, from others, from nature, etc. We got so deeply trapped into dynamics of separation, but everything is interconnected. What got us to forget that? 

The work that I do results from a personal necessity I had to reconnect. I have the need to be in touch with my feelings, to move my body, to slow down, spend time in nature, share deep talks —  and I know I’m not the only one.  

So, opening a space for people to talk about how they relate to certain topics, like the one of sustainability, and getting them to share how they really feel about it, was an important first step for me. What motivates me now (and what I wish to do with We Bloom) is to create a bridge between people who are passionate about this topic and others who are less naturally drawn to it.

How are products made? I assigned a product to two teams of two. Each team went through the 5 key stages (extraction of raw materials, manufacturing, packaging and distribution, use, end of life). Isabel and Flavio analyzed the life story of jeans - photo taken in October 2020 In Sabina, Italy.

How did you find out about the UnSchool, and what motivated you to come?

I found out about the UnSchool through a friend of a friend. I was looking for simple tools to add to my experience, so that I could demystify sustainability for those who manifested an interest in it yet didn’t know where to get started.  After I heard Leyla’s TED talk, I checked out the UnSchool webpage: finally I’d found somebody who made sustainability look cool and exciting!

What was your experience at the UnSchool like?

I did a one month Masterclass in Circular Systems Design at the UnSchool. My experience was rather short but intense. I acquired a lot of knowledge (keeping up with the amount of content was in fact quite a challenge!) and many practical tools and activities (i.e. life cycle thinking, systems mapping, theory of change etc.) to gain clarity and come up with realistic solutions to integrate sustainability into our lives.  

What was the main take away you had from coming to the UnSchool?

I knew that everything was interconnected, but I didn’t realize how interconnected everything actually was.  That was my main takeaway from coming to the UnSchool.

Tell us more about your initiative(s), and how is it all going?

Thanks to the Unschool Masterclass, I spent a month getting curious about the following questions:

• How do people relate to sustainability? 

• Why do those who’d like to take action don’t do so?

• What stops them? 

What I found out was that many of us wish to make changes in our lives. Yet often, the sensations, words and emotions associated with sustainability are so uncomfortable that they make us want to look away instead of digging deeper. 

So I came up with a simple idea to respond to that problem, and opened non-judgemental spaces - both physical and virtual - for people to share their feelings, sensations and beliefs about sustainability. I used elements of my yoga practice, my facilitation skills, and some of Leyla’s tools to give people an opportunity to explore new ways of relating to this topic.

I ran this workshop - The Sustainable Practice - in the fall of 2020 and plan to have it again very soon, both in person and online. Stay tuned!

We ended this beautiful day with a round of "Take Home Message". Each participant shared what they got from The Sustainable Practice and how they intend to relate to it from now on. - photo taken in October 2020 In Sabina, Italy.

How did the UnSchool help you start/evolve it?

The UnSchool helped me mine the problem and gave me the tools I needed to offer easy and practical activities for people to understand sustainability differently. 

How have you amplified this change you do in the world?

No matter what I do, I try to remind myself and others that WE ARE thanks to nature.   

I also try to spread what I’m learning in the various languages I speak (English, Italian, French and Spanish) to assist as many people as I can on their journey to sustainability.

How can people engage with, support, or follow your work?

I’m launching my website at the end of the month, for now you can follow me on:

Linkedin → Julie Beretta

Instagram → Julie Beretta

Any other thoughts you want to share?

My interest in human behavior is what inspires me to expand our collective knowledge of our interconnectedness with the Earth. Sustainability isn’t a passion for me, it’s a duty.  And even if what I’m putting forward  is rather simple, I believe it’s an important first step all of us can take to start living  with more intention and respect for our environment.

The Trap of Wishcycling

By Leyla Acaroglu, originally published on Medium

Image by Volodymyr Hryshchenko on UnSplash

Wishcycling is when people place non-recyclable items in the recycling and hope those items will end up being recycled. The unfortunate reality, though, is that these actions contaminate the recycling stream and reinforce the very problem of waste.

Wishcycling comes from a place of good intentions, but as we all know, good intentions do not always lead to good outcomes.

I think it’s safe to say everyone has done this at some stage.

We’ve popped the coffee cup into the recycling bin with some coffee still in it and the lid on, or that thin plastic wrapper, a pizza box, lightbulb, broken drinking glass, batteries, chopsticks, maybe even an extension cord (I’ve seen it happen), and hoped that it would go off and be magically made into some new thing.

Yet the truth is, we don’t have a magical recycling system where everything can be easily transformed into something new. In fact, most things you think are recyclable, are probably not. Recycling has not been able to keep up with the rapid changes to our hyper-disposable and complex material world. Yes, your uncoated paper, tin and aluminum cans, PET bottles, and a few other ridged plastic products can technically be recycled, but the vast majority of the packaging and products that end up in your home, can’t or won’t get a second life.

Image authors own. Source

Waste collection systems all over the world are struggling with the diversity of material combinations of products and packaging. Coupled with the recent changes to the global recycling supply chain, we have an exponential waste crisis unfolding. The list of what not to include in your recycling (because it will end often up contaminating the entire load of recyclables and be destined for landfill or incineration, all at a cost to the recycling company) is long. It’s actually surprising just how many not-to-include items are on the list in some places. That’s because recycling is different everywhere, and because we have created a material world so complex, it’s hard for the waste processors to keep up with the diversity of ever-changing waste streams.

When modern recycling first became a regular curbside thing in the 70’s (in part to reduce the amount of waste filling up city landfills), the material world was very different. Originally it was just glass, metal and paper that were separated and collected. These had clear markets they could be sold back into, and so the economics of recycling was feasible. Then came combination products like tetra packs and chip packets (plastic and aluminum together), and a vast number of plastics. The diversity of new packages and household products started to really muddy the waters for the recyclers, and over time, most recycling moved to a single market — China.

Now we live in a material age where there are tens of thousands of different material and product combinations that enter homes the world over, and after a few decades of being told that recycling is great, we wishfully place many of them in the recycle bin, feeling good and hoping for the best.

Take, for example, the samples of packaging that I collected from different retailers in the UK. I found instructions, in small print on the back, mainly telling me that the products needed to be returned to the supermarket or were not recyclable at all. I was alarmed by how many packages (organic food products I might add) explicitly stated: “Do not recycle.” Nearly all of them were non-recyclable in my household collection system, yet a quick look in the shared recycling bin in my apartment block and it was overflowing with these very same un-recyclable materials.

The issue of greenwashing — misleading consumers into thinking something is green, or in this case recyclable, when it’s not — is a topic I have talked about in the past, and this certainly plays into the wishcycling issue. But it’s not as simple as all of us being manipulated or duped into thinking that everything with a recycling symbol is recyclable.

Many of us really do wish that things we buy can be recycled because it validates us buying them to begin with.

Organic products with different instructions on where and if the packaging can be recycled!

The people producing these types of packaging and products are very rarely thinking about the end-of-life issues that their material combination choices will have on a waste stream. They deflect responsibility onto us, the customers, and onto the city that will have to manage the plethora of produced waste from their poor designs. I also think it’s unfair that there is an expectation that the customer will be able to decipher the many different options for end-of-life management, for what appears to be the same types of materials, when they are not, as there are hundreds of different types of polymer combinations.

Equally, retailers don’t set adequate guidelines on what types of packaging they will accept in their products, so it becomes a free-for-all. Without shaming the specific brands or supermarkets, I can say that a quick walk up and down the isles of several UK supermarkets showed me that most of the packaging was un-recyclable. I’m going to guess this is the same in Australia, North American, China and most other major economies.

How can we, the customers, be responsible for not recycling when so much of what our food and hygiene products are designed into, is packaging that is not even collected in most cities? Here is a selection of packaging from fruit and nut packaging from major UK supermarkets, all non-recyclable. I wasn’t just cherry-picking these ether! Go look in your cupboards and see what is actually recyclable, and what is most likely not.

Orange, lime and nut bags from two different UK supermarkets, all not recyclable.

Plastics are particularly problematic as they are not easily recycled. Whilst the industry invested 50 million dollars a year to convince us that a number inside a triangle stamped on the base of a piece of plastic will mean that the product will be recycled, the likelihood of it being turned into something new will depend on many different factors, such as: if it’s even technically possible to recycle it (often not); how contaminated with food or product it is; if the local council will collect it; if the local municipal waste processing facility will take it; and if there is a market for that type of plastic to be sold into. Oh, and if there is a market for that plastic to be made into new plastic products. The oil and plastics industry has long known that it’s cheaper and easier to just turn virgin oil into new plastic than it is to collect, clean and resell it. They have profited off us believing that recycling is the solution when they have long known it is not.

This all leads to much confusion about what can and can’t be recycled, which unfortunately leads to people’s wishcycling, which then goes on to contaminate recycling streams all over the world, and then we get blamed for it! Education alone will not fix an inherently broken system.

Mainstream curbside recycling has been around for just over thirty years, and it’s in the last fifteen years that half of all the plastic that has ever been produced has been made and sold. To add to this, more than 90% of plastic ever produced hasn’t been recycled. Not because we consumers do the wrong thing, but because most of it is not easily recyclable!

The Recycling Industry

The margins on recycling are already very thin, with the collections and sorting often being more expensive than the value of the products being recycled. Some recycling processors still use human line sorters, and others are entirely mechanical. The machines that sort waste are often engineered for the main types of recyclables, such as glass, metal and hard plastics, not the plethora of other stuff that ends up in the sorting lines.

Then, even after the products are all sorted out and bailed up, the waste processing company has to find a buyer for that specific waste stream. Metals usually have a healthy demand, and thanks to the rise in online shopping, the paper board industry is doing ok. But plastics have always struggled to find a place to go (all the more reason to focus on post disposable design).

We wishcycle in part because we have been told that recycling is great and it will solve the issue of waste (this the plastics industry did a great job of convincing us of in the 90s, by creating the numbers up to 7 inside triangles that get stuck on certain types of hard plastics to supposedly help everyone identify and recycle them — side note, the history of the design of the original recycling symbol, the triangle made out of arrows, the Mobius Symbol, is fascinating and well worth the read here in this article.).

I have explained in the past that the global recycling system is broken, and that recycling is part of driving the generation of waste. It legitimizes the production of waste and creates a false solution to a manufactured problem. But here in this article, I want to explore the phenomenon that results from confused, good-intentioned, or perhaps lazy people that don’t know what to do with certain types of waste.

I will be the first to admit that even I am one of them at times. Intrigued by how others experienced this, I asked the UnSchool team to do a quick snapshot assessment of food items in their houses. As can be seen from the image below, it’s all very confusing about what the symbols mean. The cross through the recycling symbol means it can’t be recycled, but should we be happy that these ones even have any instructions at all? Because many of the other items they found had no information stating whether it was or wasn’t recyclable. This begs the question, whose responsibility is this? Ours, the supermarkets’, the local council, the recycling companies’, the packaging designers’, the product owners’? The federal government’s?

With such a confusing mess, it’s no wonder people wishcycle!

North American packaging: single-serve applesauce, coffee, frozen berries and crisp tube.

As I explored these issues, I come to feel very sorry for the recycling sector; they are beholden to the decisions made by the producers of products and packaging, and to the lack of regulation or guidance from the government. Then they’re burdened with the responsibility of finding new homes for an ever-growing stream of disposable stuff made with little care for what its end-of-life destination or impact will be.

How big is the wishcycling issue?

The less sexy name for the issue of wishcycling is recycling contamination, and in wealthy countries like the UK, Australia and the US, it’s a massive issue.

According to the UK Department for the Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA), in 2018, contamination meant councils in the UK sent 500,000 tonnes of recycling to landfill. Research conducted by WRAP revealed that 82% of households in the UK add at least one item to their recycling that is not accepted. The amount of plastic packaging used in supermarkets in the UK is staggering. In 2017, the 10 biggest UK retailers produced 900,000 tonnes of packaging and 2bn plastic bags.

“More than two-thirds of consumers (69%) believe supermarkets and retailers are responsible for reducing the amount of plastic used, and many want to see more progress.” — Packaging News, 2021

In the US, the recycling system is increasingly under pressure. The EPA explains the conundrum of recycling: “​​Most Americans want to recycle, as they believe recycling provides an opportunity for them to be responsible caretakers of the Earth. However, it can be difficult for consumers to understand what materials can be recycled, how materials can be recycled, and where to recycle different materials. This confusion often leads to placing recyclables in the trash or throwing trash in the recycling bin.”

All over the US, recycling with no market to sell to, or place to store it is being burnt or sent to landfill. Increasing costs of processing have meant that some councils have just stopped collecting recycling altogether. This analysis shows how different states are working to address the issues with recycling in the US.

“Since 1960 the amount of municipal waste being collected in America has nearly tripled, reaching 245m tonnes in 2005. According to European Union statistics, the amount of municipal waste produced in western Europe increased by 23% between 1995 and 2003, to reach 577kg per person.” — The Economist

In Australia, a country where over 60% of people recycle, it was reported recently that 58% of plastic and 23% of glass packaging were put in the wrong bin. This is contributing to ongoing issues with contaminated exports to neighboring countries, where over 50% of recycling is sent to be processed.

To add insult to injury, Reuters reported last year that the oil industry plans on investing 400 billion dollars on plants to make new plastics and just 2 billion on reducing plastic waste. Wishcycling is only going to get worse.

Addicted to Disposability

The issues of wishcycling go deeper than just misunderstanding what is and isn’t actually recyclable. It speaks to a wider issue of waste and our relationship to it — specifically, how planned obsolescence and enforced disposability feed our addiction. To justify consumption, we need to believe that there is a better destination for our waste than just landfills, incineration or escaping into nature. We want it to be ok to create it, and as our material lives have become more disposable, more complex, there is a higher desire for the idea of recycling to work.

All over the world, the amount of municipal solid waste being generating is growing at unprecedented rates. In India, in 2001 it was 36.5 million metric tonnes, twenty years later in 2021, it’s now 110 million metric tons. This is estimated to grow to 200 million metric tons by 2041 (source, statistia).

“China is responsible for the largest share of global municipal solid waste — at more than 15 percent. However, in terms of population the United States is the biggest producer of waste. The U.S. accounts for less than five percent of the global population, but produces roughly 12 percent of global MSW and is the biggest generator of MSW per capita.” — Global waste generation — statistics & facts, Statista, 2021

Trash in a canal near Sahiwal Jhal Road in Pakistan, a Photo by Muhammad Numan on Unsplash.

Trash piling up on a London street (a very common sight), Photo by Paul Schellekens on Unsplash.

Recycling is not the solution to waste. The global increases in solid waste generation are happening at rates far, far greater than any recycling system can manage (except maybe Germany, which has policies that shift responsibility back onto the producer and Wales, which is the world's third-best recycler!).

Recycling doesn’t work because its existence incentivizes and legitimizes the creation of waste. Thus, as a solution to the global waste crisis, it does no more than temporarily mask the issue at hand. We live in a linear economy, a system that requires the production of waste for it to function. We designed an incentive system of growth that relies on continual consumption, which means we must make waste to perpetuate it. To solve the waste crisis, we need to redesign the entire system of materials and how they flow throughout the economy. And certainly, companies need to be held accountable for the things that they create and pump out into the world.

This is the biggest design challenge of our time. How do we redesign everything so it works better for all of us? How do we meet human needs without destroying the systems that sustain us? This is the topic of a book I’ve been working on for some time and the more I reflect on the changes that need to occur, the more I see that many of the solutions put in place (such as recycling) are actually reinforcing the problems and preventing us from reimagining the systems that created this issues to start with!

I find this a hard realization to voice, but under the current system, recycling is a key part of legitimizing the disposable economy we live in and thus we need to stop relying on recycling and demand a full redesign.

Recycling contamination. Photo by Vivianne Lemay on Unsplash.

Aspirational Recycling

Recently there were reports of UK recycling being dumped in Turkey after the recycling market took a huge hit from the China waste ban that started in 2018 (the rise in waste trafficking is a rabbit hole I will explore in another article).

This is where the wishcycling situation plays into a psychological bias we are all part of. It’s also called aspirational recycling, which feeds into the desires that people have to “do the right thing.” Here, we all want recycling to be the solution to our growing global waste crisis, so much so, that people are likely to recycle items that connect to their self-identity, such as the coffee cups or the take-out food containers, even if they have a suspicion that they are not recyclable (which cups are not, nor are black plastic take out containers). A Harvard Business Review article claims there is a bias whereby waste production is increased through the pre-knowledge that an item could be recycled, which leads to an increased use of disposable items. So we trick ourselves into using things that are non-recyclable by wishing that they were. This is the root cause of wishcycling.

We collectively rely on recycling as a crutch, allowing the potential of materials being reused to justify our continued consumption and use of disposable items.

Industry relies on this collective bias to continue to produce more and more non-recyclable stuff and feed into a collective misunderstanding of what is and isn’t recyclable. Confusion is a great tool for distraction. When known side effects (such as the millions of tons of plastics in the oceans) come to light — and even though there is a nonexistent recycling system for the billions of tons produced each year— they go back and blame it on us for not recycling properly!

Is Recycling Worth It? By NPR

Then there’s the issues of different rules in different places, and the persistent claims from industries that things are recyclable (even if they are not), along with the misinformation that recycling is somehow the silver bullet solution to the world’s waste crisis — it’s no wonder we’re so misdirected. We wishcycle because we have been told that recycling is the solution and we all want to do the right thing.

Our desire for things to be “greener” often makes us do un-green things. This is not really our fault though; we’ve all fallen victim to decades of marketing spin from industries addicted to disposability, saturated with ads that tell us that littering is the issue and recycling is the solution. The false answer to a manufactured problem is to believe that a simple act of separating our waste into that which can be recycled and that which will end up in the ground or being burnt will fix the myriad of environmental and social equity issues that waste creates.

Recycling may have a place in a well-designed circular economy, but it will not solve the problem created by our addiction to easy, convenient, disposable stuff. The only way we can stop waste is by designing it out of the system to start with and this requires us to redesign everything, the materials used, the way we create products through to the entire economic system that they work within.

Wishcycling is part of a fairytale that has been told to us over and over again, it says recycling is a good solution to a massive problem. It feeds into our collective delusions that disposability can be remedied by the same system that benefits from waste. This all adds up to confused good-intentioned people who put their broken Christmas lights and soiled diapers in the recycling and hope for the best. And an industry that then blames the customer for not getting it right.

Where did the wishcycling concept come from?

The term “wishcycling” first appeared around 2015 when journalist Eric Roper wrote about the waste industry’s rising challenge of dealing with new types of materials and polymers that were making their way into the recycling bins of households.

In an article, Roper interviewed Bill Keegan, who was the President of a waste and recycling firm DEM-CON, where he mentioned the idea of people wishing things would be recycled. Inspired by the concept, Roper wrote a follow-on piece the following week about the concept of wishcycling where he detailed how plastic bags and bowling balls, food sachets, and loose bottle caps were all contributing to recycling contamination.

In the article, Roper explains, “A number of materials in particular frequently show up at local processing facilities, causing problems for the complex machines that make curbside single-sort recycling possible. They ultimately end up comprising the ‘residual’ waste that facilities cannot recycle.”

Wishcycling on the news (on Fox news!)

According to the industry magazine Recycling Today, “there are five common curbside recycling contamination themes: tanglers (hoses, cords, clothes), film plastic (plastic wrap or bags), bagged things (garbage or recycling), hazardous material (propane tanks, needles/sharps) and a category that can be summed up as ‘yuck’ things that downgrade other materials and clog the system (food, liquids, diapers, etc.).”

To help address this, on a practical level, online tools like this can help keen people figure out what can and can’t go in their recycling right now. But let’s be honest, the average person is more likely to make a quick judgment based on assumptions, leading to wishcycling. I know in my case, I feel guilty when I put things in the normal waste bin, so I want to avoid it and hope that the oat milk tetra pack is indeed going to be recycled!

Commonly wishcycled items:

Paper coffee cups: They are lined with plastic and have polystyrene lids so are not easily recycled. These have to go in the trash, so get a reusable cup for your daily caffeine fix!

Paper take-out containers: They are also often lined with plastic and if not then contaminated with the oils and residues of the food, the best you could hope for is the unlined ones going directly in your home compost or organic waste collection.

Broken glasses and ceramics: Recycling facilities are usually high-tech places that use lasers and magnets to separate out the recyclables. But often there are humans working a line, and broken glass can’t be picked out by the machines — humans with hands have to separate them out.

Pizza boxes: Any food-contaminated paper product is hard to recycle because the fibers absorb the grease and thus make the recycling process harder. So they have to go in the general waste or if you have organic waste collection/composting then it should go in there.

Flexible and soft plastics: These are basically ALL your food plastic packages that are soft and flexible, such as crisp and candy wrappers, rice bags, nuts and loose lettuce bags. Anything that is flexible is unlikely to be recyclable in most mainstream waste recollection services. Some stores offer a takeback program if you are diligent enough to separate, collect and take them back to your store.

Any electronic item: 100% of these have to go in a dedicated electronic waste recycling collection service. They are filled with complex and often toxic materials and can even explode, so be sure to find out from your local council about collections and drop-offs for e-waste.

Light globes: Most light globes are made of several different materials and thus can’t be recycled through the normal collection and need to be taken to a specialty recycling drop-off location.

Any household item: Broken toys and old T-shirts are most likely not recyclable in your household collection. These need to be taken to a specific location or better still, repaired and resold.

What can we do about it?

Waste is produced as a result of consumption. So the first thing we can do is nip the issue in the bud by not buying the things that can’t be recycled to start with. Of course, it would be even better if the companies who produced unrecyclable crap stopped designing such items, and supermarkets and producers got together and figured out how to create more universal packaging solutions that dramatically reduced waste, to begin with. Ahh, that would be bloody brilliant. But in the meantime, whilst we all wait for some of the biggest companies in the world to catch up to the growing global demand for a circular economy (I’m looking at you Amazon), then we have to each take on the task of figuring out what is actually recyclable in our community and then be a bit more diligent about where it ends up.

I for one buy mostly from a local food producer who only sells local produce and delivers it in reusable boxes. When I do have to shop at the supermarket I try and take a bit of time to read the packaging (and I still get it wrong sometimes FYI). I compost all organic waste and include all light uncoated paper products and bio-based plastics in the compost drop-off point (this will be industrially processed so all the biodegradable packaging can go in it).

It can feel insignificant to take these small micro-steps against a tidal wave of waste, but our own actions are calculated up and used to influence the actions that industries take. Once they realize people are actively avoiding certain products, they will be forced to refect and hopefully change. Wherever we can flex our consumer power, we help shape the way new trends emerge through demand (oat milk, and vegan food options, for example, is a relatively new addition to grocery shelves for a reason!).

Wishcycling is a symptom of a much broader issue at play: we have designed a world addicted to waste and disposability. Until we break that cycle, we, as everyday people, will continue to have to navigate our way through the material complexity that is thrust upon us.

But as long as we believe the fairytale that recycling will solve our waste crises, then we will continue to enable industries to get away with creating more and more disposable, unsustainable and un-recyclable crap.

——————

If you want to get started on your change-making journey, then check out my list of free tools for circular and sustainable design, or explore the everyday actions you can take via my United Nations collaboration, The Anatomy of Action.

The big opportunity for systemic change is in the way we do business, so I have courses on circular systems design, sustainable design, the circular economy and how to activate sustainability in business.

If you are interested in diving deeper into how to activate sustainability in any size business and want to help to bring about the transition to the circular economy, then consider signing up for my 2-day in-person Masterclass this October in London.

— -

Additional sources used in this article:

Rebecca Altma, Discard Studies, On Wishcycling, 2021, available here

Stephanie B. Borrelle, The Conversation, Recycling isn’t enough — the world’s plastic pollution crisis is only getting worse

Jackie Flynn Mogensen, 2019, Mother Jones, One Very Bad Habit Is Fueling the Global Recycling Meltdown

Erin Hassanzadeh, 2021, CBS Minnesota, Pandemic-Driven ‘Wishcycling’ Is Causing Big Problems At Recycling Centers

Drew Desilver, 2016, Pew Research Center, Perceptions and realities of recycling vary widely from place to place

Tom Mumford, 2020, ReCollect, Wishcycling 101: When Good Intentions Lead To Contamination

Activate Positive Change this Earth Day with 50% off at #UnSchoolsOnline!

It’s almost Earth Day again and whilst we truly believe that every day should be Earth Day, we are always excited to join in the celebration of the big blue beautiful dot we call home. 

So from April 20-22, we are doing a flash sale with 50% off everything at UnSchools Online*! This includes all our brain-activating courses, engaging digital toolkits, paradigm-shifting handbooks,  our new skills badges that help you show off your smarts, and even the brand new 3 Dimensions of Sustainability in Business 4-Week Sprint course!

🌏  Use code ‘earthday21’ at checkout to get your smartypants discount from April 20-22! 🌍

*For all subscriptions, tracks and payment plans, 50% will be taken off your first month’s payment only.

This year, EarthDay.Org is running not just one, but 3 days of climate action throughout April 20-22. Since we know that bridging the gap between wanting to do something and actually doing something requires knowledge, tools and activation, which when applied breeds confidence and results — we want to provide you with positive feedback loops that help you start or continue in making positive change for the planet! 

We’ve said many times before, and we will keep screaming whenever we can, we need to be celebrating and protecting our beautiful life-giving planet and shared home every single effing day. 

Last year, our founder Leyla Acaroglu wrote a perspective on Earth Day 50 (which happened in 2020) where she said: 

The tragic trade-off of our expansion and domination over the globe is all too obvious. Take a peek at any one of the exponentially-growing environmental concerns: ocean plastic waste, air pollution, deforestation, the Sixth Great Extinction, climate change. As we sit stuck in our homes, lamenting and stressing about the killer virus sweeping through our communities and blaming it on bats, we forget that we made all of this mess. We destroyed the habitats, we created the market for live animals, we facilitated the air pollution and environmental conditions that are starting to be correlated with high death rates of COVID-19. We lit the match that started the fire, and we are responsible for finding the means to extinguish it without destroying the place in the process. 

Humanity is completely reliant on Earth’s majesty, and it’s time for us, as a species, to get our shit together and respect the systems that sustain our very existence. Let’s commit together to activating our individual agency to help contribute to the needed collective change, and as creative rebels, as individuals, as business leaders, as government representatives--whoever you are and whatever you do, just get activated in making change so that every day, we celebrate the splendid life we get to live on Earth.

“There is no other known life-support system in the entire universe as magical as this one, the one you are on, right now, orbiting a sun whilst being orbited by a moon, whilst moving through space. This life-giving beauty is our home, and for some magical reason, it gave you and me and all the other things here life. This life we were given requires us to breathe air to survive. Do you see that tree or little bit of green trying to get up through the cracks on the pavement? Its entire system of existence, the fractals that formed its repeating design of leaves and branches and roots — these are the same building blocks that we are made of.” - Leyla Acaroglu, Why Every Day Should be Earth Day

Making change does not have to cost money either! Here are three free things you can get right now: 

1. If you want to help activate your organization this Earth Day, download our new (free!) action-oriented toolkit, the 3D Sustainability in Business Framework Free Starter Kit.

2. Making change is easier when you have like-minded friends! Download our new community app here for desktop or search ‘UnSchools’ on your mobile phone’s app store to start connecting. You get the first 30 days for free! 

3. Check out all our free resources and find your superpowers with our free Everyday Superpowers toolkit.

6 Focused Learning Categories to Boost your Change-Making Skills

Here at The UnSchool, there’s a handful of things that we never stop talking about: making positive creative change, embracing systems thinking, normalizing sustainability, igniting the circular economy, leveraging the Disruptive Design Method, and finally, diving into Cognitive Science by hacking our brains, mindsets and biases so that we can all expand our sphere of influence and active our agency to make massive sustainable changes to the way we live on this beautiful planet we all share!!!

When we started this experimental knowledge lab in 2014, we did so with the intent to give others the tools they needed to disrupt the status quo and solve complex problems in order to make the future work better for us all. Now that we’ve been fully operational for almost 7 years, having transferred knowledge to thousands of change-makers like you all around the world, run fellowships in 10 countries (!), and created >80 offerings at UnSchool Online, we decided to organize our courses, toolkits and ebooks into the themed-knowledge areas that we focus on the most. 

Our six brand new learning categories — Systems Thinking, Sustainability, Circular Economy, Creative Change, Disruptive Design, Cognitive Science — are designed to help you find what you need more efficiently and take a more targeted approach to refining your creative change-making skill set. Whether you are brand new to the world of making change or you’re a leader in creative change, we have offerings that can help you build your knowledge bank, refine your skillset, and amplify your impact. These new learning categories are simply like destinations on your change-making journey map, and we’ll step you through where to go based on where you are right now. 

Over the next few weeks, we’ll spotlight each of the new learning categories here in our journal to help give you a better understanding of why these focused areas are so important not only to us — but for your work, too. Stay tuned! 

PS: Speaking of knowledge transfer, have you browsed our recently upgraded Free Resource Library lately? It’s packed with brain-activating content (like Leyla’s Decade of Disruption report, or The Circular Classroom or Sustainability in Business!)  and practical tools (like the Superpower Activation Kit, the Circular Redesign Kit, and our personal Post Disposable Kit!) that you can utilize right away.

Launching Now: The UnSchool Community App!

The UnSchool Community App is Now Ready For Download!

After months of hard work and some serious challenges overcome, we are overjoyed to announce that our beautiful new UnSchool Community App is ready for you to join! 

Yes, an app — you can go search for it right now in the Google Play or Apple stores to download and start connecting! The first 30 days are on us :)

If you prefer a desktop experience, go to https://community.unschools.co/ on your computer now. No phone needed; it has all the same features as the mobile version.

We are very proud of what the UnSchool Community App has to offer, so keep reading to learn all about what you can expect when you sign up — and feel free to DM us any questions once you get into the app itself. Cheers to community, connection, and collaboration!

What is the UnSchool Community App?

The UnSchool Community App is a dedicated social connection app designed to inspire and foster collaboration amongst our growing global community of change-makers.

Whether you're just getting started or you’re more advanced along your change-maker journey, grow among a supportive international community filled with professionals and emerging leaders who share a common mission for a more sustainable and positive planet. 

As a bonus, we’ve integrated our online learning school into the app, so you can access any course that you’re enrolled in directly on your device! 

Here’s what you can look forward to (beyond the daily dose of optimism and creative inspiration coming through push notifications):

• Challenges: Monthly themed content + guided activation challenges for everyone.

• Connections: A global community community of changemakers to help you continue upskilling, collaborating and staying motivated.

• Conversations: Pop-in livestream conversations with guests like Leyla Acaroglu, UnSchool team members, alumni, certified Educators and invited guests. 

• Collaborations: Join a challenge team to hone your creative change-making skills.

• Courses: Access all of your UnSchool enrolled courses right inside the app.

• Credentials: Take what you learned and apply for skills validation badges that are blockchain encrypted and easily shareable. 

• FREE Take Action course: Advanced skill-building content to discover the fundamental principles of the Disruptive Design Method. 

• FREE content: Download free tools on systems, sustainability and design. 20% of UnSchool content is always open access — but you get special access to new content via the app.

• FREE month: Sign up now for a monthly subscription and get 30 days free exploration and participation.

• FREE annual bonus: Pay for a year subscription and get two months free (12 months for the price of 10!).

What inspired the UnSchool Community App?

Aside from the world being much more mobile these days, we are always looking for new ways to activate our growing global community of creative change-makers.

We wanted to make a destination for positive and proactive conversations, collaborations and connections for all the passionate systems-thinking change-makers like you.

We built in private rooms as well, for alumni and those of you who are on certification tracks. Online learning is GREAT, but one thing we always hear is how people miss the engagement and connection with others. So we wanted to build a space for live humans to talk to live humans as they go through the coursework or just life.

Get access to all your enrolled UnSchool Online classes, the community engagement feed, and an activation hub for monthly challenges and content!

How much does it cost?

The first 30 days are free to test drive the app, meet all the other people who have joined, participate in the challenges and conversations, and access all your courses that you’ve enrolled in.

We charge a subscription fee to help us make more change possible, to cover the creation and management costs of our community features and to ensure we can continue to build our offerings and open access programs.

We give away 20% of our content for free, so having a fee for things we offer helps others who wouldn’t otherwise be able to afford the cost to access these resources.

When you pay for anything at the UnSchool, a portion of that goes to supporting the scholarships we give away. We are entirely self-funded (and proud of it!) so it is our community that helps us to decouple education from economics.

If you are unable to afford the subscription, we offer a limited number of needs-based scholarships on a discretionary basis. You can apply online here:

ARE YOU A TRACKER OR ALUMNI?

All existing Certification trackers and enrolled Masterclass participants get free access throughout their enrollment. If you don’t see the Alumni or Tracker groups when you get the app, send us an email at programs@unschools.co and we’ll get it sorted out for you.

Here are 3 reasons to start your 30-day SUBSCRIPTION today: 

1. Exclusive monthly challenges: Articles, activities, prompts, challenges, downloads and links focused on a new critical skill and knowledge area each month. The Activation Hub is your one-stop-shop for bite-sized content to help you make positive change. 

2. Social Feeds and Community Groups: Connect with like-minded people to collaborate, share, support, connect, vibe and get more positive stuff done! Don’t get bogged down in the negative mainstream social media, find your community of people who care deeply about designing a sustainable future and take action in creative, contemporary ways.

3. UnSchool course access: Be free of your laptop! Use the same email as your UnSchool Online account to access all your enrolled courses — a great way to listen to course material while out and about. Bonus: all new app signups get enrolled in a free Monthly Activation challenge!

Activate yourself to be a force for positive change by bringing knowledge, connection and motivation into your daily routine. The community will help keep you moving forward, making positive social and environmental change no matter what the world throws at us. See you there!

8 Creative Change-Maker Skills You Learn at The UnSchool

We know people like you want to help change the world. What a relief it is to know that you're not alone! The UnSchool was created for people just like you, and you can get involved by joining our blossoming community of creative change-makers from around the world who all agree that we can design a better future.  

The UnSchool’s community is made up of creative rebels, problem solvers, and activated change-makers from all walks of life. They are deeply passionate about making positive change — a  crew of people wanting to get busy unf*cking the multitude of social and environmental problems around us. Pandemic or not. 

For the last six years, we have taught thousands of people how to make positive change. We know that it’s not one person’s responsibility to save the world, but that every single one of us can change it for the better.

The suite of practical tools we share through our online courses and workshops are perfectly tuned to help you take action. 

Systems mapping at an UnSchool workshop

Just wanting to be a part of change is not always enough to evoke action. We have to contend with our brain biases that thwart our efforts (Netflix and chill overload, anyone?), even among the most committed of us. 

Making impactful, tangible change takes a specific mindset and toolset that helps hack these brain biases. Offering an applied knowledge set that anyone can use, the tools that we share at The UnSchool help you unravel complex interconnected problems and design positively disruptive interventions that leverage change. 

When you take an UnSchool offering, you can expect transformative learning that enhances your reflective, critical, and systems thinking perspectives as powerful tools required to participate in changing the world.  

We draw upon an existing knowledge bank to transfer skills to you via our Masterclasses, Online Courses or live online Workshops.

Here’s an overview of the 8 key skills you’ll gain and why they’re so crucial for any creative change-maker’s toolkit:

1. Problem Framing

Here at The UnSchool, we love love love problems and all of the brain-stretching fun that comes along with understanding what makes them tick. We’ll teach you how to love them as well (and encourage you to sleep and eat your veggies to help that brain stretching!).

You’ll learn how to write problem statements and frame your change initiatives as creative quests so you can quickly get to the heart of what it is you’re seeking to change.

Great classes that will help you gain this right now are Make Change, Research Strategies and Project Activation and Amplification.  

2. Systems Thinking

A core component of the three pillars of our philosophy (systems, sustainability and design), is the power of systems thinking. It is unmatched in creative change-making and a fundamental part of any good practice.

Everything is interconnected, and in order to leverage creativity while making change — actually, in order to do just about anything — one needs to know how to see, identify, interact with and think in systems. 

Take our very popular Systems Thinking course or get started with our Introduction to Systems Mapping. More advanced players can take our Systems Intervention course. 

3. Systems Mapping

When it comes to making change, knowledge without application isn’t very useful. So while thinking in systems is a great start, applying a systems mindset to designing interventions is where the real magic lies.

To help you put your systems thinking knowledge to work, we’ll teach you how to map systems via various tools like cluster maps and interconnected circles maps (and later, how to design sustainable interventions based on the insight you glean from those maps!). 

Get started with Introduction to Systems Mapping, or read our e-books Design Systems Change or Circular Systems Design. 

4. Life Cycle Thinking 

Similar to systems thinking, you’ll uncover the secret lives of everyday things when you begin viewing them from a life cycle perspective.

We’ll show you how to easily map the production flow and material impact of anything created, as well as show you how to access life cycle data to give you the skills to do quick, paper-based life cycle explorations for comparing products and services. 

We cover this in detail in our Sustainability in Business 101 course and in our Introduction to Life Cycle Thinking course. 

5. Theory of Change

A Theory of Change is an approach to setting actions to get outcomes that you can map. You could say it is a description, or illustration, of the approach you would take to enact change, and it can be done both for an actual intervention or for an entire philosophy on how change happens. 

We will show you how to reverse engineer your change objective by using the theory of change methodology. This is an incredible way to not only lay the pathway for change but also develop a benchmark for measuring change initiatives in the future.

Jump into the wonderful world of making change with our Make Change course, or level up your change initiatives with our Project Activation and Application course. 

6. Circular Design

We are all consumers in the current linear economy, but as we transition to one that massively reduces waste and instead promotes a variety of reuse approaches, we will each become shareholders in the delivery and cycling of goods and services throughout the economy.

The Circular Economy requires a redesign of nearly everything, so we’ll equip you with all the circular design (and redesign) tools and strategies you need to be apart of this global transformation.

Get reading with our Circular Systems Design e-book, download our FREE open-source Circular Redesign Toolkit or take our Introduction to Circular Economy Class to advance your capacity in this important skill. 

7. Gamification Design

Gamification is the use of game mechanics in non-gaming environments, and it has become the hot tool for user experience design. It is a technique of dissecting and exploring the mechanics that motivate action in non-gaming environments — and it can truly be a ‘game changer’ when it comes to making creative change (say that 3x fast!)

You will learn all about the mechanics of gamification, the different ways you can apply it to effecting change and the fascinating world of human behavioral motivators.

We have a course in Gamification and Game Theory that covers everything you need to know! If you are already into gamification, then take our Cognitive Science and Bias course to learn more about the behavioral patterns around this. 

8. Activation Planning

Pulling it all together, your activation plan is the last step before you launch your creative change idea into the world. This helps you feel confident and prepared to do what you set out to do: change the world.

We show you the tactics and practical ways of turning an idea into action and ensuring that it has sustainable, long-lasting impact.

Our Project Activation and Amplification course is the perfect place for you if you want to get your change-making ideas out into the world. We also have a 30-day activation challenge that is perfect for you if you are keen to effect change and want to learn ALL THE TOOLS!

---

Many of these tools can be found outlined in our FREE toolkits. You can access them suit of them here >

If you’re ready to make it happen, join us for our first live online Masterclass of 2021, The Disruptive Design Masterclass!

Taught over the course of 1 full month, you will cover one of these toolsets via 2x weekly live sessions with a cohort of like-minded creative change-makers.

Want to know what the experience is like? Check out Alumni Milosz’s experience here. 

The Sustainability Status: Part 1 of Decade of Disruption: Future of the Sustainable Workplace in the Age of Covid-19 and Climate Change

Last week, we shared the exciting launch of our groundbreaking report, Decade of Disruption: Future of the Sustainable Workplace in the Age of Covid-19 and Climate Change, written by Leyla Acaroglu and commissioned by Unily.

Over the next few weeks, we’ll be sharing highlights from each of the three parts of the report, starting with Part 1, The Sustainability Status. If you’re keen to dive into the full report right now, go ahead and download it in full here — it’s totally free! And, if you are ignited to start your workplace sustainability journey, then take one of our Sustainability in Business Programs or week-long intensive. 

This opening section of the report gives you a 360 degree perspective of the trends and forces influencing the transition towards sustainability in the workplace by exploring the opportunities and actions that are currently emerging as the defining forces shaping the transition to carbon positive and sustainable workplaces.

THE DECADE OF DISRUPTION: 2020-2030

 The last two decades have seen a rise in “green” office strategies that range from assessing the energy, waste and water consumption through to sustainable procurement and behavioral change initiatives, but now we are seeing the elevation of change towards business model transformation for the circular economy. 

This decade was already set up to be one of great change even before the crises of early 2020.  Transformation of both the entire economy and social practices was accelerated by the global pandemic that swept around the world, wreaking havoc on markets, changing business operations, altering people's lives and challenging healthcare systems. The Covid-19 crisis is emerging  entirely new ways of working, living and doing business. But even before this, the foundations for massive change were already being laid out for businesses. Here we explore some of the great disruptions unfolding this decade.

INDUSTRY 4.0 

We are in the midst of a fourth industrial revolution. Industry 4.0 is fueled by digital transformation, Artificial Intelligence, robotics and networked communication systems.  Exponential changes in technological development alters the way we manufacture, produce and consume goods and operate within the economy. The interconnection of devices and services so that technology communicates to enable the more efficient and seamless creation of goods, along with the rapid growth in connectivity, is creating entirely new ways of doing things. Offices, factories, cities and homes are getting ‘smarter,’ which when designed well, can lead to significant efficiency and productivity gains.  

“This manufacturing revolution will increase productivity, shift economics, foster industrial growth, and modify the profile of the workforce”.  - Industry 4.0, BCG

The Circular Economy 

In response to the waste and pollution crisis, the Circular Economy calls for a total reconstruction in the way we design, deliver and engage with the goods and services that make up the economy. This involves moving from a linear production process - whereby waste and pollution are built into production systems - to a circular one that allows for new business models, design processes and supply chains that cycles resources through a well-designed closed loop system. Products become services and entire value-chains are redesigned and managed to eliminate losses and increase the value of materials extracted from nature. 

“Adopting circular-economy principles could not only benefit Europe environmentally and socially but could also generate a net economic benefit of €1.8 trillion by 2030”. - EU Circular Economy Action Plan, Mckinsey and Company 

Climate Change

Humans have long had an obsession with tracking the weather. For much of our history, the ability to predict the weather has helped us build, feed and navigate societal development. The current and predicted changes that will occur this decade if we do not curb global greenhouse gas emissions will make reading the weather have an entirely new meaning as we see more freak weather events, longer, hotter summers, increased frequency of catastrophes and rising sea levels impact coastal regions. The degree of impact will depend on the actions taken now, and with nearly all countries in the world ratifying the 2016 Paris Agreement, there is hope that the worst will be avoided and the best brought out in our global community. 

“Ambitious climate action could generate US$26 trillion in economic benefits between now and 2030 and create 65 million jobs by 2030, while avoiding 700,000 premature deaths from air pollution” - New Climate Economy: Commission on the Economy and Climate 

2030 Global Goals

The United Nations has marked the end of this decade as the goalpost year for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs are a set of 17 global goals that, if achieved, will bring about a sustainable and equitable economy. Many companies are adopting the SDGs as operating guidelines for corporate activity, Despite there still being disconnects between rhetoric and action, there is a strong drive for this decade to be one where global action on sustainable development is made and successes achieved.

“Our analysis shows 72% of companies mentioned the SDGs in their reporting, but only 25% include them in their published business strategy. Furthermore, just 14% include specific SDG targets”. - Welcome to the 2020s: The 'make or break' era of sustainable development, PwC

Global Health Crises

The World Health Organization has long been calling for concern over the threat of  global health pandemics, and the Covid-19 crisis has certainly changed the way we live and work. The long term impacts are unknown, as is the potential for an increase in pandemics in the future. The crisis has drawn many parallels to the needed action in combating climate change, as the response to the Covid-19 reminded many that action to abate the negative impacts of climate change also requires collective action. The connection between the destruction of nature and the increased risk of pandemics has been raised by leading biodiversity experts. There’s a likelihood that the coronavirus pandemic will be followed by even more destructive disease outbreaks if the cause behind the continuous destruction of natural capital does not come to a halt. 

“Many of the root causes of climate change also increase the risk of pandemics. Deforestation, which occurs mostly for agricultural purposes, is the largest cause of habitat loss worldwide. Loss of habitat forces animals to migrate and potentially contact other animals or people and share germs” -Coronavirus and Climate Change, Harvard Medical School

The Green Recovery 

The Covid19 fueled economic crises will be built on a green recovery plan, especially in Europe where the European Union is driving the campaign to build back better. The United Nations Secretary-General, António Guterres, proposed six climate-related actions to shape the recovery post Covid-19 in a call to action for governments to build more resilient, sustainable and inclusive societies. Aiming for carbon neutrality by 2050 and the protection of biodiversity, the green recovery plan outlines: 

1. Monetary recovery packages that deliver new jobs and businesses through a clean and green transition.

2. When taxpayers’ money is being used to rescue businesses, it should be tied to achieving green jobs and sustainable growth.

3. The use of fiscal firepower to drive a shift from the current grey to a green economy, empowering societies and people to be more resilient.

4. Public funds should be used to invest in the future and flow to sustainable sectors and projects that help the environment and the climate by ending fossil fuel subsidies and encouraging polluters to pay for the impacts that they create. 

5. Climate risks and opportunities are to be incorporated into the financial system at large, as well as all aspects of public policy making and infrastructure.

What else is in Part 1?

The rest of Part 1 dives into the megatrends impacting this decade of disruption. Megatrends are massive cultural shifts that unfold in real time, creating identifiable patterns that can be observed and interacted with as they emerge and evolve to affect society at large. 

We identified 8 societal level megatrends that are affecting the ways we work and the types of business models that will be successful in the future, all of which are covered in detail in the full report. The future is changed by our actions today, so these trends are a manifestation of the behaviors, desires, aspirations and actions of those operating in the workforce and business world right now. 

We also share the results of a survey of 2000 UK-based office workers, from graduate entry level jobs through to Senior Manager level, who were surveyed by Censuswide in August 2020. A range of questions relating to the impact of Covid, their perceptions of sustainability and work life changes were presented, and Part 1 captures fascinating insights from select data responses.

Launching Now! Decade of Disruption: Future of the Sustainable Workplace In the Age of Covid-19 and Climate Change — a Report for Unily, by Disrupt Design

By Leyla Acaroglu

When I was invited by Unily, an intranet development company, to research and write a report on the future of sustainability in the workplace, it was just before the global pandemic hit. Within weeks of starting the research, the world ground to a halt, and the positive and negative impacts of the Covid-19 crisis started to form, making for a fascinating time to be working on a futures report! 

Today we launch the resulting report on the forces affecting this disruptive time we are living in: Decade of Disruption: Future of the Sustainable Workplace in the Age of Covid-19 and Climate Change. I explore the macro and micro trends driving change and the impacts of massive disruptions like Covid-19 and climate change on the workplace.

Decade of Disruption: Future of the Sustainable Workplace in the Age of Covid-19 and Climate Change

I am so proud of this work. My small team and I worked solidly for 8 months during the pandemic, exploring the megatrends and emerging micro forces that will define the divers for change this decade, looking at what is already underway in bringing about a sustainable future and how this affects the workplace. From today, you can download the report for free here. 

I hope that all the creative changemakers out there who have been working tirelessly in the last 10+ years to sound the alarms on global environmental crises like climate change and plastic waste pollution can adapt the perspectives and insights explored through this report, written at such a unique time during the throws of the emerging Covid crisis — a time that has brought to the forefront of the world’s attention the need for urgent systems change in order to bring about a sustainable and regenerative future, now.  And business is critical to this transformation. This is why alongside this we have the Sustainability in Business Program series designed to support organizations make the shift to operating in sustainable and circular ways.

The Report 

Transformation of the entire economy and social practices, accelerated by the global pandemic that swept around the world, wreaked havoc on markets, rapidly changed business operations, altered people’s lives and challenged healthcare systems. As a result, the Covid-19 crisis is emerging entirely new ways of working, living and doing business. But before this, the foundations for massive disruption were already being laid out for businesses, with several forces of change playing out, this report explores these and how they will continue to drive change this decade.

Through the report, we highlight a number of case studies of leading organizations who are pioneering change, and we explore in detail 12 emerging drivers propelling a pathway towards sustainability within the workplace, starting with the cultural shifts in how and where we do business and expanding out to the operational foundations of the modern workplace. We explore how they emerged and what pioneering organizations are already doing to adapt to these influential forces, showing how Covid-19, sustainability, climate change, and the Circular Economy are affecting the workforce in multi-pronged ways.

The report is presented in three main sections: a highlight of the six relevant megatrends predicted and already emerging as a major influencer this decade; a detailed exposition of 12 micro forces driving these megatrends and how they relate to the workplace and shifts within business operations; and a diagnostic toolkit for business managers to assess where they are on their sustainability journey, with a detailed set of maps of where to go from here to stay ahead of the pack. Stay tuned for more information about each section, as we will be sharing highlights from each of the three parts over the next three weeks, here in our journal!

Through identifying trends unfurling in real-time, this trend report is designed to support business leaders in the process of adapting to this decade of disruption.  

Covid-19 and climate change are just two of the most obvious forces impacting our way of life. What we will see unfold over this decade is a great amount of collective reliance in our ability to rapidly transform the way we do everything. The demand for change is great, from workers, to customers and business leaders - the trend towards sustainability being an integral part of the modern workplace is emerging from multiple directions.

This trend report is designed to support business leaders in the process of adapting to this decade of disruption. 

Two highlights for me are the identification of the defining drivers which contribute to the megatrends and the micro transformations that will continue to drive change, and the sustainability in business self-assessment tool that helps any organization reflect and assess where they are at and helps lay a pathway for how they can leverage positive change and transform into a sustainable workplace. 

As part of the exploration, 2000 UK based office workers, from graduate entry-level jobs through to Senior Manager level, were surveyed by Censuswide in August 2020. A range of questions relating to the impact of Covid, their perceptions of sustainability and work-life changes were presented and selected data responses are shown throughout the report. It was found that there is a rising concern among workers around the impact of the companies that they are working for with 72% of respondents being concerned about environmental ethics, 83% feel that their companies aren’t doing enough and 63% want more green skills to strengthen their workforce value.

Activate + Design the Future of Your Workplace Now

Sustainability is about ensuring that decisions made today don't impede the ability for future generations to have the same, if not better quality of life as we do today, and in the context of work, it's about ensuring that workers, workplaces and business structures are ethical, equitable and economically viable.  Every organization will be at a different stage.

As the case studies throughout the report show, there are many ways to engage with sustainability and multiple opportunities to lead through these complex times. The most important thing is getting started,  and this report will support you in gaining the insights and advantages of establishing a journey towards a sustainable workplace.  

Get Our New FREE Facilitation & Creative Development Toolkit

Positively disruptive communication can be tricky not just to create, but also to engage in. But, with pressing global issues, concerned changemakers need the know-how to navigate discourse and dialogue around things that matter the most. 

This new (totally free!) toolkit, a collaboration by Disrupt Design with support from OxFam Asia’s Lab, is designed to support the creative exploration and development of digital campaigns for activating positive change using the Disruptive Design Method (DDM). 

The 60+ page illustrated toolkit includes a step-by-step guide to facilitating engaging workshops and designing creative campaigns to activate change in the digital space.

Part 1 shares a workshop process through systems thinking and creative ideation using the DDM, and Part 2 provides a set of actions to support designing and developing creative and engaging digital campaigns.

Activating Change 

By running through the content of this toolkit, you will be supported in exploring and developing exciting new opportunities for creating effective engagement campaigns that move people into action. One of the key things in designing effective campaigns that activate change is understanding the issues you are seeking to address, knowing the system it exists within and developing unique and engaging ways of communicating the desired change. This toolkit is designed to help you facilitate getting from issues to ideas to action!

Part 1: Applying the DDM

Many of you are already familiar with the DDM’s approach to problem-solving, one which helps develop a three-dimensional perspective of the way the world works and provides a unique way of exploring, identifying, and creating tactical interventions that leverage systems change for positive social and environmental outcomes. It incorporates research and problem exploration (MINING), systems thinking and modes of interventions (LANDSCAPING), and then ideation and creative development (BUILDING). 

In the context of designing positively disruptive communication, the DDM is effective because it initiates a framework for something that is very innate to us humans: creative problem solving! Many people think that they are not creative, but creativity (the ability to come up with new and unique ideas) is actually a very natural human instinct. People have been creating new and unique things forever, and each day, every one of us creates things to make our lives more effective and enjoyable. We cook, clean, write, draw, tell stories, play — these are all forms of creative expression. This toolkit helps apply the DDM in a way that feels natural and organic, as well as exciting and revelatory. 

Part 2: Creative Campaign Design

After running through the creative process of the DDM In Part 1 and getting a tangible idea that you want to develop into a creative campaign, you will need to prototype and design the final concept.  Prototyping is the technique of turning ideas into a tangible physical concept that you can share with others, get feedback on, and refine your idea into a viable solution. In this section of the toolkit, you will find a quick guide covering design approaches for digital campaign communication design. 

Design is critical to any campaign success, especially in the hyper-visual digital space. Well communicated ideas are what help change the world. The goal here is to design the right approach to engage your intended community with your ideas and provide the right motivation for taking action. Campaign design is about several key factors: tone and style, visuals, layout and language. 

It’s not just what you say; it’s also HOW you say it. 

We communicate in more ways than ever these days: verbally, through body language, social media, text, television, and also through colour, symbology, and the imagery that we choose.

It’s therefore critical to understand, respect and ethically leverage what our cultural understanding is of these subtle and not-so-subtle ways of communicating to our both own and the wider global community while minimizing unintended consequences and miscommunication.

There are now lots of useful tools to help create beautifully-designed digital communication, from social media posts to posters and videos. By following the simple steps laid out in the toolkit, anyone can come up with more beautiful and impactful campaign designs. After running through this campaign design flow, you will have stepped through the design process of exploring and deciding on the aspects of effective communication to your community — setting yourself up for success in conveying important messages in an effective, tangible way that creates positive change.

We hope you enjoy the toolkit and it helps you facilitate and activate more positive change in the world!

Why is this free?

We are committed to helping anyone, anywhere make positive change and give away a minimum of 20% of all our content for free. We have a range of free toolkits and courses you can find online here. We are only able to do this, thanks to the support of our customers and clients who pay for our classes and workshops.

Sustainability In Business Series Launch

Exciting news: We’ve launched the first of four programs in our new Sustainability In Business Series! 

This program is the introduction level to a more detailed 3-part series, the goal being to provide the right initial framework for you to get started within your organization, no matter what industry you are in or how far along your sustainability journey you already are. 

BUILD ORGANIZATIONAL RESILIENCE AND MOMENTUM WITH PRACTICAL TOOLS AND INSPIRATIONAL KNOWLEDGE

Our new online organizational training programs are designed to develop the knowledge, motivation, practical tools, and personal inspiration to help individuals and teams within organizations engage with and transition toward being sustainability leaders in their field.

Led by Dr. Leyla Acaroglu, UNEP Champion of the Earth and respected international expert on sustainability, systems change and strategies for advancing the circular economy, our new series on activating sustainability in business is packed with knowledge, inspiration, advice and actionable tools that enable your and your team to find unique and tangible business solutions. 

Meet the Sustainability in Business Program Series with Dr Leyla Acaroglu.

About the Introduction to Sustainable and Circular Business Strategies Course

This program is practical, actionable, and easy to digest in a short period of time. We’re excited to share some highlights with you to help you see exactly what the Sustainability in Business series is all about — and why it is so crucial that we begin approaching organizational change with sustainability as a key focus. You’ll kick off your transformation by uncovering the core concepts and approaches to sustainability in business, be inspired by diverse industry case studies and then map your action plan.

The introductory program will kick off your transformation by uncovering the core concepts and approaches to sustainability in business. Be inspired by diverse industry case studies and map your action plan:

• Part 1: Sustainability and Circular Economy Transformation in Business 

• Part 2: Case Studies of Sustainability Initiatives in Business

• Part 3: Leadership and Activating Change

The below excerpts highlight how we approach sustainability in action-based, tangible ways so that you walk away with the thinking and doing tools you need to begin creating change within your organization right away. And if you want to enjoy the benefit of having live instruction with sustainability expert and UnSchool founder Leyla Acaroglu, there are still three spaces remaining for her LIVE one-week intensive Sustainability in Business Activation Program, happening this October 19-23!

SUSTAINABILITY IN BUSINESS

Sustainability is about ensuring that decisions made today don't impede the ability for future generations to have the same, if not better, quality of life as we do today. In the context of business, it's about ensuring that workers, workplaces and business structures are ethical, equitable and economically viable. 

It can be hotly contested, as the term “sustainability” has come to mean many different things over the last few years. Though, the original and withstanding idea is of a powerful aspiration to make better decisions today so that we all benefit in the future. This involves considering and working toward harmonizing the social, economic and environmental aspects of the things we do, be it the businesses we run or the actions we take as workers and consumers. 

All aspects of business activities draw on many complex systems that, in turn, result in multiple levels and types of pollution being put back into the atmosphere and general environment. 

From production and transport emissions in producing goods and delivering them to market, to the daily waste generated in office buildings, these are all contributing factors when we look at “doing work” — factors that, in turn, impact the changing climate and the general health of our natural world.

We all know that there are ‘problems’ in the world, from social issues to environmental concerns, and the current state of our world needs a comprehensive collective objective like sustainability to help provide a framework for change. That's why the UN developed the Sustainable Development Goals (we will get to that soon). Firstly, though, we must overcome some of the legacy issues we have with the concept and framing of what it means to be sustainable. We have to bust through the myths that have been inappropriately perpetuated in order to get a better understanding of what social, economic and environmental sustainability is all about. 

One of the most annoying long term ideas is that if you care about the planet, you are on the fringes of the mainstream. Given that all humans need nature to survive and that all materials come from the natural world, we need the planet to be able to sustain itself into the future.  And so do businesses — without Earth’s resources, businesses can not continue operating as they are.

Globally we are facing many major environmental issues: climate change, ecosystem destruction, species loss, the waste crisis, air pollution, plastic waste, deforestation — these issues will all continue to rise this decade unless considerate and clear action is taken. All of these impacts are affecting small, medium and large businesses in a multitude of ways. Disruptions in the supply chains; increased difficulty in obtaining raw materials from areas affected by extreme weather events; increasing temperatures for the workforce and heat-related diseases (especially in the farming, fishery, agriculture and forestry sectors); higher energy demands for cooling; declining air qualities in cities; weather events that disrupt infrastructure, transportation and societies; shortage of water; industrialization and rapid urbanization as biodiversity loss and deforestation exacerbate threats and lead to food insecurity; health risks; trade risks; supply chain breakdown and reputational risks for business for failing in the implementation of adaptation and mitigation measures. 

In short, the ability to work as we know it and the physical assets of companies are at stake. Natural capital is being destroyed, and ecosystems that provide important services to human communities are shifting, threatening not only human livelihood but also economic activity.

Sustainability is thus an all-encompassing strategic approach to equalizing the economic, social and environmental impacts of all actions, be it individually, in business, government or society at large. Within this lives many aspects of behavioral, technological, organizational, operational and cultural transformation that enable us all to move into a future that is more healthy, sustainable and positive than today.

Sustainability in Business involves the ability to assess, understand and then design better, more strategic outcomes to both the business operations and the influence that you have on society at large - as opposed to maintaining the status quo, ignoring the impacts of your actions and operating devoid of any consideration for the holistic consequences of your actions, thus, perpetuating purely economic motivations.

The main goal sustainability is seeking to rectify is that collectively humans have consumed more resources than the Earth can provide us with; everything comes from nature, and the Earth provides us with an abundance of resources from minerals to food. But right now we are extracting and using up raw materials at almost double the rate that the Earth can remake them. At the same time, we are also placing significant pressure on ecosystems by pumping all sorts of pollutants back out into the atmosphere, oceans and land. 

This is why we need innovative ways of redesigning the way we do things to ensure that we can live within the Earth's finite systems. Since businesses are the cornerstone of the economy, they offer a significant point of intervention and positive change. By redesigning the way things are produced, organizations take more ownership over the full-life cycle impacts of products and actions — this is one of the core ideas of the Circular Economy.   

We need to bust through the idea that we are trying to “save the planet” when in actual fact, we are seeking to protect ourselves. Be it from climate change or another global pandemic, the destruction of nature is, in a way, destruction of us. 

Sustainability requires a cultural shift from the old way of doing things evolving into new ways of operating, communicating and delivering goods and services into the economy. So, the employee experience around these shifts will benefit from technological services that enable the feedback and information that support a seamless transformation.  

Getting Sustainability into Business

There are many ways that an organization can adopt sustainability principles and introduce them into their operational, experiential and cultural aspects of their enterprise. This program is designed to help step you through this, but to summarize, the main goal is to understand the impacts by assessing the inputs (things that you need to consume to operate) and controlling the outputs (the releases you create in doing your activities), and then redesigning the products and services you offer so that they are neutral in these actions.

“At its essence, sustainability means ensuring prosperity and environmental protection without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their needs. A sustainable world is one where people can escape poverty and enjoy decent work without harming the earth’s essential ecosystems and resources; where people can stay healthy and get the food and water they need; where everyone can access clean energy that doesn’t contribute to climate change” - Former UN Secretary-General Ban-Ki Moon 

SUSTAINABILITY BUSINESS ACTIONS

In the 101 and 102 parts of this series, we go through the steps needed to take action on these areas of sustainability in business in specific detail. Here is a summary of the types of business actions that leaders take and those that you can start to adopt as part of your action plan. 

Environmental Auditing 

Conducting environmental audits allows a company to understand the existing operational impacts based on several key areas of water usage, waste production, energy sources and use, as well as procurement and sourcing. The simplest way to do this is by benchmarking through existing bills and service contracts and conducting site audits. Additionally, supply chain audits can be conducted to find low environmental performers, to change suppliers who are non-compliant to environmental regulations or to work with suppliers to ensure that they advance their sustainability criteria. 

Environmental Policies 

An important part of communicating to stakeholders and aligning your team is the development of robust and transparent environmental policies. These can take many forms — aspirational, practical and functional. The goal is to set a commitment that people can rally around, be clear about the pathway to action and the process of review in ensuring that you can meet the set goals and targets. 

Pollution Prevention

Taking action to reduce emissions to air, water, and land from general operations, transport, manufacturing and other industrial processes so that there is a measurable reduction in pollution-related emissions, The main types of pollution to consider are: carbon and other greenhouse gas emissions (often referred to as scope 1, 2 and 3 level emissions, which we go into detail in the 102 programs), air pollutants like particulate emissions, land and water contamination such as effluent runoff and of course, waste production. Every single company, no matter how small, will produce waste products in their operations, be it paper, plastic, metal or industrial chemicals — waste elimination is a central goal of the circular economy. 

Environmental Management Plans   

Environmental management is about considering the direct and indirect impacts of your company’s actions by understanding and working with the entire value and supply chain and taking full responsibility for the impacts of business activities. This includes conducting audits, developing policies, changing suppliers, mapping the entire value chain and ensuring that your staff and stakeholders are aware and committed to your goals. In some industries, it is required that certain environmental management regulations are adhered to, but moving beyond compliance should be the goal of all sustainability-focused businesses. 

Climate Change Mitigation

The reduction, elimination and offsetting practices that reduce or buy back the greenhouse gases released by your organization are part of the strategies needed to mitigate climate change. Any actions that contribute to the release of atmospheric compounds that trap heat and increase the temperature of the Earth lead to more extreme weather events and irreversible changes to the global climate systems. Increasingly, organizations are being called upon to lead the way in developing a climate positive society.  

Transition to the Circular Economy 

The myriad of strategies and approaches to restructuring the business model and product design and delivery transforms a business from the old pollution and wasteful linear model to one based on closed-loop and circular approaches of value creation. This massively reduces waste and increases customer satisfaction. Materials flow through value chains that ensure that waste is recaptured, businesses move to closed-loop production models and customers adapt to reuse and recapture systems.

Supply Chain Equity 

Sustainability is about social equity as much as it is about environmental protection, and many organizations now have to assess and change supply chains to ensure that there is equity to workers and producers, including fair wages, safe working conditions, a massive reduction in ecological impacts and no unethical processes, illegal activities or harmful actions embedded in the way that goods and services are produced and delivered to market. 

Resource Scarcity 

Global supply chains consume vast amounts of natural resources, and the exponential growth of linear products has placed significant pressure on natural systems, resulting in less available resources — with some reaching a critical point of scarcity. As resources become more expensive and rare in nature, we will see a shift toward more effective management and resource protection, waste mining and significantly more efficient methods of capturing and reusing high value materials. Global security depends on our ability to protect natural resources needed for a healthy society. 

Risk Management

Many of the world’s biggest financial institutions, underwriters, investors and shareholders are now demanding that decisions be made with respect to climate change due to the real risks and threats that it poses to financial security. These concerns have been brewing for many years, and even before the start of the Covid-19 crisis, organizations were starting to rethink the way they do business so that they could meet the pressures to act on climate change, respond to resource scarcity issues and meet the growing consumer demand for zero waste and ethical supply chains. 

“Environmental risks continue to dominate the results of our annual Global Risks Perception Survey (GRPS). This year, they accounted for three of the top five risks by likelihood and four by impact. Extreme weather was the risk of greatest concern, but our survey respondents are increasingly worried about environmental policy failure.” WEF, The Global Risks Report 2019

Each program in the Sustainability in Business series comes with a workbook to plan out the strategy and plan

The Sustainability in Business series of ready-to-go online training programs offer a suite of courses that support your business no matter where you are at on your sustainability journey. This 4-part series allows employees to learn a shared vocabulary, shift to more open and creative mindsets and become effectively equipped to navigate and identify complex solution opportunities for sustainability in their industry.

UnSchool Birthday Celebrations and Our Latest Video!

WE ARE 6 YEARS OLD!

Hard to believe that the UnSchool has been around for six whole years! In this short time, we are so elated to have initiated programs all over the world, have supported and connected with thousands of creative changemakers from all walks of life and been at the forefront of positively disrupting the status quo to help design a sustainable and regenerative future for all!

In this week’s journal, we take a look at our programs and accomplishments, reflect on what we have collectively achieved and get excited about what positive mischief we will get up to next.

The first UnSchool Fellowship, in New York City in 2015!

The UnSchool started in New York with our very first Fellowship of 16 brave first-timers who came with us on an experiential learning adventure in the energetic city. Since then, there have been 10 incredible Fellowships, dozens of Masterclasses and workshops both in-person and online, around the world and at the CO Project Farm. We developed and grew our online learning lab, as well as created tons of resources and tools, many for free, to support creative changemakers around the world.

Every few weeks, we feature our incredible alumni in the journal, highlighting the inspiring and adventurous projects they are working on, exploring how the UnSchool has helped them move their initiatives and career forward. We don’t measure our success on activating change based on vanity metrics like social shares or likes, but instead focus on the change that our alumni are making out in the world, taking action and participating in their communities at large. We see conversations changing and communities taking action and feel proud to be a part of this global shift toward sustainability and systems change.

Being a nomadic school means we have been invited to many beautiful and inspiring places around the world, with Fellowships in New York, Mexico City, Melbourne, São Paulo, Berlin, Christchurch, San Francisco, Mumbai, Cape Town and most recently, Kuching! We have videos of all our Fellowships on the website, and we are so happy to release the newest one here!

Explore the UnSchool's Disruptive Design method and approach to experiential education through a mini doco of our 2019 fellowship in Kuching, Malasia with a ...

Throughout the years, we have had participants join us from all around the world, with a strong equity access policy of a minimum of 20% access and free content from our own projects and the ones we are commissioned to do.

So far, we have given away over 250k USD in scholarships to people in over 35 countries around the world. We have an open scholarship form where you can apply anytime, so if you want to join us but need some support, let us know! We also have an extensive free resources section you can access here.

With such a diverse alumni group, we are always looking to expand our language access, and are happy to be able to offer the Change Makers Lab Cards in bilingual Thai and English, the Design Play Cards in Spanish and English, and the Circular Classroom in Swedish, Finnish and English. It’s on our list of things to do to keep adding more translations!

WHAT’S NEXT AT THE UNSCHOOL

Like everyone, we have been rapidly adapting and changing to the post-Covid world. We are every day more grateful that we launched our online learning platform several years ago, with around 60 classes, certifications, games, toolkits, handbooks and other resources for people like you, looking to make change and gain the tools to do so.

We’ve been busy building new offerings that include a very exciting suite of Sustainability in Business programs, both live online (join us in October!) and self-paced (coming soon!!), along with a youth program (ages 12+).

We also somehow found the time to release a cookbook of all your favourite (and more!) UnSchool plant-based meals.

And… we are releasing an UnSchool App!

In other exciting new ventures, we are building an app! We have listened and heard from so many of our alumni about the desire to be able to more easily connect with other UnSchoolers (although you do seem to pop up with collaborations quite often!) and we finally have some time to make it happen.

Watch out in the near future as we beta test an app designed to connect you to each other in a non-social media way, where we can have our own space to share, take on challenges, find each other, and connect in new and exciting ways. We’ve never designed an app before, so it will be a fun and rapidly changing experiment in which we have a great group of beta volunteers to test out and help us refine to be the best experience we can make.

We are also brainstorming ways to stay connected in the time of reduced travel, so watch out for new launches, workshops, collaborations and other ways of continuing the UnSchool adventure. Stay tuned for more info!

OUR BIRTHDAY PRESENT TO YOU!

In celebration of our birthday, we are having a 48-hour flash sale on all things UnSchool!* Use the code BIRTHDAY50 for the next 48 hours to get all things UnSchool half off and celebrate another year of making change with us!

*Subscription products will have the discount applied to the first instalment

Earth Overshoot Day & Your Ecological Footprint

Earth Overshoot Day

Every year the Global Footprint Network marks on the calendar a date that signifies the day we have collectively used up all the resources allocated for that year. It’s called Earth Overshoot Day, and in 2020, it falls on the 22nd of August. This is actually much better than 2019’s date, which was the 29th of July. This shift in a more sustainable direction is mainly due to the economic slow down as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Adapted from Earth Overshoot Day, last year we were a month behind this year.

The Global Footprint Network combines the most reliable data available and forms a set of reasonable assumptions to assess the current resource use of humanity. They look at changes in carbon emissions, harvesting of forest products, food production and fossil fuel demand, along with other factors that have an impact on global biocapacity. The research team concluded that this year, as a result of the global pandemic, there has been a 9.3% reduction in the global Ecological Footprint compared to the same period last year, as reported on the Earth Overshoot Day website.

“The novel coronavirus pandemic has caused humanity’s ecological footprint to contract. However, true sustainability that allows all to thrive on Earth can only be achieved by design, not disaster.” - Earth Overshoot Day

The changes reported by the World Footprint Network as a result of changes to the economy from the Covid-19 pandemic

Your Ecological Footprint

Earth Overshoot Day brings awareness to one of the main issues that sustainability is seeking to address: we collectively consume more than the Earth can provide us with. Everything comes from nature, and the planet provides us with an abundance of resources, from minerals to shelter and food. 

But since the early 1980s, we started to extract and use more resources at a rate faster than the Earth can replenish them each year. This means we are eating into future generations resources and creating a deficit. Thus we need to find creative ways of meeting our human needs, living prosperous lives, but whilst maintaining and respecting the life support systems that sustain life on Earth.

The ecological footprint methodology is a tool that helps individuals, cities, countries, and the entire world understand how big an impact they have on the one planet we all share. The eco footprint method looks at many 'impact categories', which are areas of our daily lives that have impacts on the planet and then provides a calculation of how many earths would be required if everyone lived your lifestyle. So the place you live, the types of things you consume - these all impact the size of your personal ecological footprint.

In part inspired by the ecological footprint concept, last year in collaboration with the United Nations Environment Programme, we came up with the Anatomy of Action - a set of actions everyone, anywhere, can take to live a more sustainable lifestyle. Using the hand as a memorable reference for the actions we each take in our lives, we can opt to reduce our footprint by making more effective lifestyle choices that reduce the impact of our actions.

Move the date

Each year there is a campaign is to #movethedate for Earth Overshoot Day so we can get back in line with the Earth’s ability to sustain us. The last time this was the case was in the late 1970’s, so we need to collectively move the date back to December 31st, so that we are living within the carrying capacity of the planet.

In honor of Earth Overshoot Day, we challenge you to measure your own ecological footprint and see what kind of present impacts your lifestyle is having on the planet.

From the Earth Overshoot Day website, the lifestyle areas that we can change to help #movethedate

Did you know that currently, we need 1.6 planets to sustain the consumption and lifestyle choices of all the humans alive today!? “From 1961 to 2010, Ecological Footprint accounts indicate that human demand for renewable resources and ecological services increased by nearly 140% “ says a report on our growing ecological footprint.

This is our collective impact, but what is your individual footprint? Click on the image below to do the calculation and see! Then check out the Anatomy of Action to find ways you can reduce your impact and help design a more sustainable future.

Lets take action!

At the UnSchool we are all about agentzing people to help design a future that works better than today, we have classes, handbooks, toolkits, advanced learning tracks and masterclasses all on activating systems change for a sustainable and circular future.

As for the gift, to celebrate Earth Overshoot Day being moved back nearly a month this year, we’re having a 24-hour, 50% off Flash Sale on everything* at UnSchools Online, on this Saturday, 22 August!

Use the code MOVETHEDATE when you checkout, and get 50% off anything in our extensive online learning hub.

Help #MoveTheDate by activating your agency and contributing to making positive change with tools on sustainability, systems thinking, creative problem solving, and more at UnSchools Online!

*for certification tracks this applies to the first month only

The Covid-fueled plastic waste crisis unfolding

By Leyla Acaroglu

What a conundrum: we are in the middle of Plastic Free July, whilst also being in the middle of a global pandemic that, due to the increased concerns around safety and hygiene, is demanding the increased use of disposable single-use products. 

In the weeks after the start of the lockdown, Thailand reported a 62% increase in the discarding of disposable plastic products as a result of the pandemic. This is for a country, like many others, who in January had announced progressive approaches to reducing plastic waste. Some recent stats estimate that 13 million tons of plastic waste pre-pandemic would end up in the ocean each year, and now no one knows what the true cost of this surging use in disposable products will have on this global waste crisis. Based on our current trajectory though, it is estimated that by 2040, plastic pollution will weigh 1.3 billion tons. The numbers of disposable personal protective equipment (PPE) being ordered by governments are staggering alone. The UK 28 billion, France 2 billion — and China’s daily production of face masks in February soared to 116 million, which was 12 times higher than the previous month. What will become of all of this disposable plastic waste? 

For every month that we face the Covid-19 pandemic, it is estimated that globally, we will use and dispose of 129 billion face masks and 65 billion plastic gloves. You don't have to go far these days to see the discards of someone else's safety concerns — a dark blue disposable glove lying at the base of a city tree, a light blue disposable face-mask by the side of a trash can, or even worse, various supplies laying limply in the gutter, just waiting to be washed out into the ocean as the street cleaners come and wash it away. 

Before the pandemic, we already had a global waste crisis on our hands, and then the global shutdowns put a halt on progressive action to reduce the reliance on single-use disposable products like disposable food packaging. Given that millions of people are swapping from in-restaurant dining to ordering take-out, we have seen a surge in use of convenience packaging. Add in all the medical supplies, hygiene supplies, and PPE, and all of this has given rise to single-use products skyrocketing at a time when recycling can’t keep up. 

Financial Times called this a “toxic pandemic waste-crisis,” reporting this week that, “A study published on Thursday forecasts that the flow of plastic into oceans would nearly treble by 2040 to 29m tonnes per year if much greater action was not taken by governments and industry.” WHO has said that a 40% increase in PPE production will be needed to meet the growing global demand. 

California has announced they will put their plastic bans on hold due to Covid-19. Wired reports “Even if the industry could handle this crush of ‘recyclables,’ and even if it were economically feasible to process all the stuff, many recyclers have shut down in response to the pandemic. Curbside recycling programs have been suspended by dozens of county and local governments, from Miami to Los Angeles County, according to the trade publication Waste Dive. Recycling facilities are struggling to figure out how to protect their workers, who are concerned about virus exposure from handling materials.” Furthermore, the World Economic Forum states that in the United Kingdom, illegal waste dumping has risen 300% since the pandemic started. 

Most disposable masks are made from finely woven plastic fibers that are not recyclable, but even if they could be recycled, it’s very unlikely that they would, given the issues with recycling medical waste, especially in a time of a highly infectious virus. But there are reports of people wishcycling their masks by popping them in the recycling bin, which in turn, puts sanitation and waste workers at risk. To be clear, right now, unless you find a designated bin that is marked for face masks, they are not recyclable. And, as I have reported on before, recycling validates waste. Given that we are in a global recycling crisis, it is not good enough to rely on recycling as the solution to the complex disposability problem. 

So yes, we are indeed in a conundrum, considering the need for personal safety in the face of a deadly virus as well as planetary protection for current and future generations. More so than ever before, we need ways of meeting these needs through sustainable and circular solutions. 

We need to design our way out of this by creating new products that meet these needs and support the adaptation of these new approaches. 

WHERE CAN WE START?

We know that masks are extremely important for collective safety, and for many people, dining in restaurants is still not possible. Here are 8 ways you can avoid disposable, single-use products: 

1. Get a couple of reusable, washable masks. Wash and rotate them to avoid using single-use ones. (Consider taking up a new hobby by making your own! There are many useful tutorials online.)

2. Encourage your friends and co-workers to do the same with their masks. Consider asking your employer to bulk purchase reusable masks (and even get them branded, if that helps justify the additional costs!).

3. Reuse take-out containers at home for storing other items if you get food to go. 

4. Search out restaurants and delivery services who are making the effort to reduce unnecessary waste and who are selecting lower-impact materials. 

5. Learn to cook new things at home. 

6. If you have to use disposable, store it so that you can reuse it the full number of recommended times, and consider using Terracycle for PPE recycling. 

7. Check this article for more advice on how to stay sustainable during the pandemic. 

---

At the UnSchool we are dedicated to helping create a more sustainable and circular world by design. We run programs, develop tools and support thousands of people in developing their skills, ideas and projects for activating positive change, If you are interested in designing solutions for a sustainable world, then apply to join our upcoming 1 month live masterclass or check out our online programs here. 

8 Ways to Make Online Education Engaging and Interactive

By Leyla Acaroglu

Since we are all now suddenly spending a significant amount of time in online learning environments and digital meetings, and I have been running programs online for several years pre-pandemic, I have been reflecting on what does and does not make online learning work.

Here I have compiled a list of things that I think help make digital learning experiences more effective, as well as things to avoid if you want your participants to be more engaged and motivated through the somewhat more complex 2D world of online learning —  be it in a workshop or even just an online meeting. 

I usually run live online one-month intensive training programs that mirror the core content we teach at any of the UnSchool in-person programs. We started offering these types of intensive online programs a few years back after it was obvious that for some people, getting to a physical location was challenging especially with family responsibilities etc.

Given that we are very committed to equitable access, we started offering a one-month, live, small-group program on the Disruptive Design Method, Systems Change and the Circular Economy and I was fascinated to see how effective these could still be for effective learning and creative change outcomes. 

Since the Covid crises, like many others, we had to suspend all our in-person programs and convert to online. Each time I have now run one of these intensive masterclasses online, the group really amazes me, and I am just as inspired and educated as they are after the program is complete! 

8 ways to stay engaged

Here are eight of the things I have discovered help make online education more effective: 

1. Always get people to introduce themselves in a way that helps the rest of the group be excited about working with them. At the start I give people 2-5 minutes to share who they are and why they are taking the program, along with something weird or wonderful about themselves — the latter always helps break things up and give us a giggle. Laughing is so important for human bonding, and it helps to ease any tensions some participants might have at the start. 

2. Ensure everyone keeps their video on so that everyone can see that everyone else is engaged. Of course, offer people the opportunity to switch it off if they have to pop out, but if you are in a one-hour session, then most people should be visible to help get the benefits of social visual interaction, like mirror neurons. 

3. Break people up into groups and get them talking. If you use Zoom (which we have for years), you can pop people into breakout rooms. It's an amazing feature, as it sends your participants into however many rooms you want for a smaller conversation. So say you can have a group of 10; you can put them in 5 rooms to have one-on-one time or in 3 rooms to have a bit more of a group discussion. You can’t see them unless you pop into a room, and you can call them back at any time to the main room. This helps people process new information, connect with their peers and ensure that they all can participate.

4. Get people doing things. I always pick someone and ask them for an example or to respond to a question, or I get them to write a list of reflections for 2 minutes, or break out into a room and discuss the activity they just did. I also give homework tasks too, then at the start of each session, two or three people share their actions and reflections on the homework task. Interactivity, online or off, is key to cognitive engagement and seeing how others respond to tasks is a very effective peer learning tool. 

5. Keep on time, as it helps respect all people in the group. Especially in a digital environment, people often have to leave right at the end time, and it is always awkward if some pop out before you have finished. So, I work really hard to keep on exactly the time we agreed, and if I have to go over, I make a quick offer for people to pop out if they need and then watch the recorded video later. But I think it's super important to respect the group dynamics by ensuring everyone can be there from start to finish together and say a nice goodbye before rushing off to whatever they have on next! 

6. Use time well. I always plan out my session in chunks of time and make sure I break up any direct instruction so that there is some interactivity. Maybe at the start, middle or end during a lecture session, I will get the participants time to respond or go to a breakout room and do something. In a workshop session, I design several activities around the core learning goals for that session to do alongside the presentation. I often use time restrictions to ensure that when a breakout room happens, they know that they have to be efficient to get the outcomes and then report back when the group reconvenes. 

7. Be understanding. Online learning can be tough for some, as there may be distractions around them or on their computer with seeing messages or emails come in. I understand that kids might start crying or the postman arrives, so let people know that you get it so that if these types of things happen, they don't feel awkward when they have to respond to them. The goal should be that these humans connected via the internet beamed into their homes are supporting each other, gaining the knowledge and experiences that they need from both the instructor and one another and that there is an acceptance that this is not the same experience as being in a room together with the outside world disconnected from our inside learning experience. 

8. Tell stories. This is a good engagement for any type of learning, and the more narrative base information you give, the more likely people are to retain the information that you are sharing. 

3 Things to Avoid

Here are three of the things that I feel reduce the potential for effective digital learning: 

1. Don’t assume that people will be engaged just because they are online; especially now, our attention is often split between many different things. The responsibility of the instructor is to design experiences that are engaging and that motivate participation. Just because someone is in your Zoom room doesn't mean that their mind is present with you, so find ways of ensuring that they are present. I like to see my role as a preforming of exciting learning experiences.

2. Don't get annoyed at people for being late or having not completed a task you asked of them. Online learning is very different from in-person learning when it comes to social pressure, and it can take a bit of time for people to find the motivation to do the work independently instead of in a group dynamic. So, be a bit empathetic to this and give people the opportunity to still contribute, perhaps by emailing it to you later that week for feedback. 

3. It may be that you lose a few people. Given that there are so many different types of learning systems, it's inevitable that one or two people in your group may find online learning just doesn't work for them. We always check on people if they don't show up to a session and try and find out what we can do to help them with their learning journey.  

To be fair, I teach adults and so these ideas apply to adult learning. I think kids and teenagers would have an entirely different set of success features that educators need to bring into their repertoire. I know from my own experience of going from mainly teaching in rooms with humans that the transition can be a bit awkward at first, but for me, the joy in teaching this way is in being able to connect with people all over the world and to have them learn from each other.

When designed well, online learning can have just as profound of an impact as face-to-face programs, ensuring that people have the space to engage and connect with each other and that you, as the instructor, are tracking your content to the learning needs of your group. 

This year, I have already run two month-long programs, and we have a third one coming up this September. I have been so inspired and energized by the outcomes that I am really committed to continuing to find ways of ensuring more people can successfully learn this way.

I don't think digital should replace in-person learning and engagement, as there is just so much cognitive benefit from being with other like-minded humans while trying to solve and uncover complex things. But for now, this is a great way to ride out lockdowns and uncertainty with a group of other humans who care about the same things as you and who are self-selecting into a digital space dedicated to learning how to make positive change. 

If you are interested in joining my next program, the September Circular Systems Design Masterclass, there are still a few places left. Apply here >

Quick Guide to the Disruptive Design Method

By Leyla Acaroglu, Originally published on Medium

The Disruptive Design Method (DDM) is a systems-based approach to creative problem solving for tackling complex social and environmental issues. It combines sociological inquiry methods (mining) with systems explorations (landscaping) and design and creativity (building) approaches. The method is built on systems, sustainability and design, allowing for a three-dimensional perspective shift of a problem arena to ensure that interventions create positive change. Here we cover a quick guide to the DDM. 

We live in a complex interconnected world riddled with dynamic and often chaotic problems that requires a mindset and skillset shift in order for us to address them at a systemic level. 

The Disruptive Design Method is an approach to problem-solving that helps develop a three-dimensional perspective of the way the world works, and provides a unique way of exploring, identifying, and creating tactical interventions that leverage systems change for positive social and environmental outcomes.

The three-phase process of Mining, Landscaping, and Building (MLB) is cycled through to create outcomes that are creative and sustainability-focused. This approach offers a micro-to-macro-and-back-again perspective of the problem arena in which you wish to create positive change within and supports the development of a more three-dimensional worldview. 

The three phases of the Disruptive Design Method: Mining, Landscaping and Building

In this quick guide, I explain the what, why, and how of the DDM, along with ways it can help create non-conventional approaches to addressing complex problems, such as those presented by the UN Sustainable Development Goals. 

We use systems boundaries to define the spaces we wish to explore, and then find connection points perfect for a tactical intervene (which is often not where you would intuitively think, based on your starting knowledge in the problems arena). Then, because we have all this new knowledge from mining and landscaping, we can rapidly develop divergent and creative approaches to intervening in the systems the create change.

Any problem from small, hyper-local concerns to massive global issues can be explored and evolved through this method, and because it’s a thinking and doing practice, it can be adapted and evolved based on the problem. The core of the approach is always systems, sustainability, and design.

POSITIVELY DISRUPTIVE BY DESIGN 

Design is an incredibly powerful tool that changes the world. Everything around us has been constructed to meet the needs of our advanced human society, and in turn, our individual experiences of the world are influenced dramatically by the designed world we inhabit. 

We are each citizen designers of the future through the actions we take every day, which is why I developed the DDM as a systems-based creative intervention design method for exploring and actively participating in the design of a future that works better for us all. 

Intended as a way for creatives and non-creatives alike to develop the mental tools needed to activate positive change, the DDM approaches creative problem solving by mining through problems and employing a divergent array of research approaches, moving through to landscaping the systems at play and identifying the connections and relationship dynamics that reinforce the elements of the system, and then ideating opportunities for systems interventions that amplify positive impact by building new ideas that shift the status quo of the problem at a systems level. This is then cycled through in an iterative way until the outcome is tangible and effective at altering the state of the issue at hand. 

The DDM is an iterative process

As Buckminster Fuller teaches, often the smallest part of the system has the capacity to make the biggest change — and that’s one of the fundamental approaches that the DDM enables: identify the part within the system that you have agency and ability to impact.

Instead of avoiding or ignoring problems, we teach you how to be problem lovers who dive right into the sticky center of the issue; then, you will get busy designing divergent solutions that build on your unique individual sphere of influence, which is the space we can all curate to affect change on the people or things around us. Your personal sphere of influence will grow and ebb and flow over time.

Additionally, the DDM includes a 12-part knowledge set that, when explored as a whole, equips anyone with the thinking and doing tools to be a more aware and intentional agent for positive change. It also has the tools to cycle through the issues and seek out the non-obvious opportunities, designing divergent interventions and solutions that build on your unique individual sphere of influence. These are topics of self-development explored in my latest handbook Design Systems Change and through my 30-day Challenge. 

Perhaps most importantly though, instead of avoiding or ignoring problems, this method offers up tools for shifting perspectives that enable one to become a problem lover with the ability to dive right under the obvious parts of the issue at hand, avoid laying blame, and instead, identify and uncover the parts of the system that reinforce the issue so that change can be created. 

In a world where many people see and feel problematic impacts with intensity — the social, environmental, and political issues especially — and then become overwhelmed or disabled by this complexity, we see good-intentioned people disengage from taking action. Thus, I can not understate how powerful seeing problems through the lens of opportunity, optimism, and yes, even a bit of love can be for someone. I want to provide an agentizing effect, a set of tools that enable people to move from overwhelming problems to possible actions; after all, the world is made up of the accumulation of individual actions of many, you and me included.

Problem loving is the DDM mindset

THE ORIGINS OF THE DDM

When I first started to develop the Disruptive Design Method, it was in part a reaction to the one-dimensional problem-solving techniques that I had been taught through my years of traditional education. Back in 2014, as I was finishing my PhD and preparing to launch the UnSchool of Disruptive Design, I knew that there needed to be a scaffolding that would support all the content I wanted to fill this experimental knowledge lab with. Drawing on the years of professional experience and research I had to date, I went about iteratively developing and refining the modules from 20+ down to 12 core components of the Disruptive Design Methodology set, a learning system that, once fully engaged with, fits together to create the DDM.

The 12 core modules of the Disruptive Design Methodology

It’s a ‘scaffolding’ because it’s not intended to be rigid and formulaic, but instead, it offers the support that one needs as they start to develop a more three-dimensional view of the world and adopt the skills of systems thinking, problem exploration, and creative intervention design. I personally use this approach in all the commissions and collaborations I do, like in designing learning systems for Finland and Thailand, and in creating sustainable living initiatives, like the Anatomy of Action with the UNEP.

A scaffolding is often used to create support around a building as it is going up — it’s the skeleton structure that enables the progression up into the air. This is the intention with the DDM, to offer support as a 3D worldview and mindset is developed to overcome reductive thinking and create a more robust set of tools that enable a problem-loving approach to solving complex real-world problems. 

I, along with my team, have taught the DDM and the core approaches of systems and life cycle thinking to thousands of people all over the world, from teenagers to CEOs, with hundreds of alumni completing our in-person programs and thousands enrolled in our online school. We have seen many different incarnations of the DDM and its tools in action throughout our five years of running the UnSchool and its various programs. 

The world needs more pioneers of positively disruptive change — people equipped with the thinking and doing skills that will enable them to understand and love complex systems and then be able to translate that into actual change. There are, of course, many tools and approaches for designing change, and the DDM is just one of a wide suite of tools out there. I am an appreciator of many of them, but for me, the reason why anyone should gain an overview of this approach is that it combines the three pillars of systems, sustainability, and design, of which I have not seen an approach yet to do the same. 

What this all boils down to is having a unique method on hand to positively intervene and disrupt the status quo of any problem arena to ensure that the outcome is more effective, equitable, circular and sustainable. That’s why we always offer equity access scholarships and ensure that people from all walks of life can gain access to these valuable perspective-shifting tools we offer at the UnSchool.

THE 3-PARTS OF DISRUPTIVE DESIGN METHOD

There are three distinct parts of the Disruptive Design Method — Mining, Landscaping, and Building (MLB) — each is enacted and cycled through in order to gain a granulated, refined outcome through iterative feedback loops.

The first part is Mining, where the mindset is one of curiosity and exploration. In this phase, we do deep participatory research, suspend the need to solve, avoid trying to impose order, and embrace the chaos of any complex system we are seeking to understand. The tools of this phase are: research, observation, exploration, curiosity, wonderment, participatory action, questioning, data collection, and insights. This can be described as diving under the iceberg and observing the divergent parts that enable us to understand a problem arena in more detail.

The second stage is Landscaping. This is where we take all the parts that we uncovered during the Mining phase and start to piece them together to form a landscaped view through systems mapping and exploration. Landscaping is the mindset of connection, where you see the world as a giant jigsaw puzzle that you are putting back together and creating a different perspective that enables a bird’s eye view of the problem arena. Insights are gathered, and locations of where to intervene in the system to leverage change are identified. The tools for this phase are: systems mapping (cluster, interconnected circles, etc.), dynamic systems exploration, synthesis, emergence, identification, insight gathering, and intervention identification.

The third part of is Building. This is the creative ideation phase that allows for the development of divergent design ideas that build on potential intervention points to leverage change within the system. The goal is not to solve but to evolve the problem arena you are working within so that the status quo is shifted. Here we use a diversity of ideation and prototyping tools to move through a design process to get to the best-fit outcome for your intervention.

The key to this entire approach is iteration and ‘cycling through’ the stages to get to a refined and ‘best-fit’ outcome. Why do we do this? Because problems are complex, knowledge builds over time, and experience gives us the tools to make change that sticks and grows. This cycling through approach draws upon the Action Research Cycle to create an iterative approach to exploring, understanding, and evolving the problem arena.

The three applied parts of the MLB Method are based on a more complex Methodology set. This set combines 12 divergent theory arenas to form the foundation of identifying, solving, and evolving complex problems, as well as helps develop a three-dimensional perspective of the way the world works. From cognitive sciences to gamification and systems interventions, the 12 units of the Disruptive Design Methodology are designed to fit together to form the foundations of a practice in creative change-making.

THE FOUNDATIONS: SYSTEMS, SUSTAINABILITY, AND DESIGN

The UnSchool is deeply rooted in a foundation of applied systems, sustainability, and design, forming three knowledge pillars that hold up all we do — including leveraging the Disruptive Design Method. 

The three pillars of the UnSchool and DDM

Whenever we teach a program, we always begin with systems thinking as the foundation, as it is one of the most powerful tools that we can use to address complex problems. It enables any practitioner to see how everything is interconnected, and systems can be viewed from multiple perspectives, allowing a shift from rigid to flexible mindsets. We also engage with the principles of sustainability through each phase, which for us, means doing more with less, understanding how the planet works so that we can work within its means, and evolving from an extraction-based society to a circular and regenerative one. 

Through the Mining phase, systems boundaries are used to define the problem arenas that one wants to explore. Through systems mapping, research techniques, observation and reflection, all the parts that make up a system and their connections are explored through the landscaping phase, laying the groundwork for exposing unique places to intervene (which is often not where you would intuitively think, based on your starting knowledge in the problem arena).

From this, new knowledge is built from the Mining and Landscaping phases, which forms the foundation for the Building phase — rapidly designing divergent and creative ideas to intervening in the problem arena. Any problem from small, hyper-local concerns to massive global issues can be explored and evolved through this MLB Method. And, because it’s equally a thinking and doing practice, it can be adapted and evolved based on any problem. The core of the approach is always systems, sustainability, and design. 

HOW THE DISRUPTIVE DESIGN METHOD HELPS MAKE POSITIVE CHANGE

LOVING THE PROBLEM

Many people avoid problems, which means that they never truly understand them. By learning to love problems and see them as opportunities in disguise, you will develop an open mind that thinks differently. This is all about being curious and trying to understand something before you attempt to solve it! The more curiosity you can foster, the more things you will uncover about the world around you.

SEEING RELATIONSHIPS

Everything is interconnected, and actions create reactions. Being able to see the relationships that make up cause and effect are part of any good problem solvers tool belt. The content of the DDM is designed to foster systems perspectives as well as deep identification with cause and effect relationships.

PERSPECTIVE SHIFTING

The ability to see the world through other people’s eyes is critical to building resilience, empathy, and leadership skills. You will uncover how to constantly reflect and explore the world from diverse perspectives, overcome biases and be able to put yourself in the shoes of others to understand why people think or behave differently to you based on their own life and learning experiences.

COLLABORATION

Respectfully and successfully working with others, despite differences, is critical to creativity and leadership skills. The goal is to encourage people to see that diversity in collaboration is just as important as agreement, and that coming to a consensus can be achieved in many different ways. Many of the tools we teach, such as systems mapping, can be used as brilliant collaboration tools, so you gain incredible opportunities to foster effective collaboration.

---

At the UnSchool, we approach making change as a state of being; we believe that being change-centric is a way of defining a life agenda, finding purpose, and setting the tone for how you live and contribute through your life and work. We all have the power to affect positive social and environmental change in and through everything we do, from the things we buy to the conversations we have and the kind of work we do. This change-centric approach is by all means a cultivated one in which you have to work at wanting to make change. Because truly, it’s not always easy; in fact, trying to make change can definitely hurt sometimes — and frankly, it often requires some measure of failure along the way. How would we have evolved as a species had we not experienced millions of years of failure and accidents? Allowing the space for failing early on creates better, stronger results later. In saying this, it should also be noted that change is one of the easiest things to make happen… if you have the right tools and resources, which are built into the DDM.

You can take the full program at your own pace via our online school here, or if you do a certification track, you get access to the full 12 modules, plus loads of extra content on activating and facilitating change.