As a result of further interest and a few technical issues at the hosting school during our last GlosGeog event, it was agreed to try and squeeze in a virtual repeat before the end of Term 4. With schools all having different Easter holidays, it was hard to find a date to suit everyone concerned. Nevertheless, it was decided to opt for this afternoon and offer a recording and copy of the accompanying slides to those unable to attend in real time.
Once again, our speaker for today’s GlosGeog event was Professor Kenny Lynch, Lecturer in Human Geography and based at the University of Gloucestershire.
After formally welcoming and introducing everyone, I handed over to Kenny to talk about ‘Skills for a greener future through geography‘. He shared the agenda for the session and a little background about himself and the University of Gloucestershire, before encouraging students to complete a quiz via a MS Online Form (https://forms.office.com/e/wKMRagMWWf?origin=lprLink), which revealed some rather interesting results.
Next, Kenny displayed the below question and quote:
He outlined the basis for this criticism and stated that an open letter had been written to the Secretary of State for Education in early 2025, in which Dr Morgan Phillips commented that:
Later, Kenny posed the question, ‘What are green jobs?‘. He shared profiles and a short movie clip (https://youtu.be/rth-VM3kscE?si=0789-vvviT9_OzrC) of several graduates from the University of Gloucestershire to exemplify where a geography degree had taken them. Kenny projected a couple of slides, one relating to change over the last year and the other showcasing a number of recent headlines, which proved to be rather enlightening.
Kenny attempted to make the session as interactive as possible by asking students to consider the greenest thing they have ever done. We were very impressed by one student’s growth of vegetables and herbs and another school having an allotment with fresh produce being used in lunch-time meals. Both are simple and effective activities to reduce food miles.
Kenny defined green skills, green jobs, green attributes and green values. He challenged pupils to identify green jobs from a long list of occupations. Kenny demonstrated how some of the green skills referenced in the profiles and short movie clip could be classified into technical, transferable and geographical. He displayed a young person’s response and highlighted the need for us to be optimistic, proactive and forward-thinking.
Lastly, Kenny discussed how to get a green job. The slides that he subsequently showed pushed youngsters to reflect on their motivation, purpose, likes and interests, as well as providing some valuable advice for their next steps and links for further research. Kenny stated that he could be contacted via social media feeds or his work e-mail should anyone require additional guidance or support (@glosgeog.bsky.social; @lynchkenny.bsky.social; @glosgeog; @lynchinglos; klynch@glos.ac.uk).
In the remaining few minutes, I chaired a Q&A session. I started the ball rolling with a couple of questions for Kenny, before inviting contributions from the audience. These questions addressed many topical issues and provoked some lively discussion too.
‘Concluding comments‘ from teachers and students can be viewed below:
Green jobs, skills and futures.
Hearing about examples of green skills in jobs pupils didn’t initially believe would be ‘green’.
Interesting; informative; inspiring.
The technology worked well this time around, which was a positive, and the actual content was inspiring for the students to hear about the potential avenues they could go down once they leave the school.
Many thanks to Kenny for giving up his time to inspire and enthuse several young geographers. They appear to have gained a lot in a short space of time; an insightful, relevant and purposeful afternoon.