UNITAR Global Water Academy and York University launch free online courses
To empower learners world-wide to respond to the global water sustainability crisis, UNITAR Global Water Academy and York University are launching three new courses today – World Environment Day.
The three free, online courses, On Thin Ice: The Impacts of Climate Change on Freshwater Ice, An Introduction to Indigenous Relationships to Water on Turtle Island, and Introduction to Big Data for Water Sustainability, will play a pivotal role in delivering accessible knowledge on freshwater to the global community. The start date for the UNITAR Global Water Academy @ York courses is flexible.
To date, the Global Water Academy has reached 10,000 leaners across 153 countries. The courses build on the Global Water Academy’s focus on social justice, diversity, and the public good.
Professor Sapna Sharma, director of the UNITAR Global Water Academy, and York Research Chair in Global Change Biology in York's Faculty of Science, says: “The goals of the Global Water Academy and our latest courses highlight our commitment to democratizing education to our global community to work towards achieving UN Sustainable Development Goal 6: ensuring access to clean water and sanitation for all.”
These courses are intended to raise awareness and foster action around UN Sustainable Development Goal 6: Clean Water and Sanitation. Learners will receive digital badges and UNTIAR certificated upon completion.
The impacts of climate change on lakes worldwide is highlighted first, in particular how and why lakes around the world are losing ice cover, and how this is relevant to the 2025 World Water Day theme of glacier preservation.
There is also a seminar course taught by international leaders on big data and big data analytics and provide learner with tools on how to acquire and analyze large global water and climate data sets.
Hillary Birch, PhD student in the Faculty of Environmental and Urban Change and UNITAR Global Water Academy research assistant, designed the course, An Introduction to Indigenous Relationships to Water on Turtle Island, in collaboration with Indigenous researchers across Canada.
“The course itself is full of fantastic clips from Indigenous scholars, elders, and knowledge holders from which people can learn directly,” she says. “The idea is to provide learners with an introduction to different ways of relating to water, particularly from Indigenous perspectives, which treat water very differently from how Western models have of related to water over the past centuries.
It's an effort to provide at least the first way of thinking about water differently and use the long-established knowledge of Indigenous Peoples to begin to shift a little bit of our thinking around how we relate to water and helps address the long challenge of reconciliation in Canada.”
The courses are designed to be engaging and interactive with images, embedded videos of community knowledge holders, multiple choice quizzes, and prompts for reflection. Learners will have the opportunity to engage directly with voices from Indigenous and local communities.
These courses are meticulously designed to encourage reflection and meaningful engagement with the materials. Sachin Satahoo who recently graduated with a Bachelor of Engineering at York University and served as the course engineer, hopes they will deepen knowledge in environmental work, encourage learners to respect Indigenous sovereignty and think about water in a reciprocal lens rather than an extractive resource.
“I'm excited for the learners to interact with the courses and go through the text, the visuals, the videos. The course format encourages a reflection and personal connection with the material, helping learners to go through it on a deeper level,” says Satahoo. “I'm proud that the course doesn't just provide information, but rather it invites learners in a new way of thinking, respects Indigenous worldviews, and presents the material in forms which are both accessible and grounded; and being able to support that work through thoughtful design and user experience.”
These courses are available on Moodle and can be viewed here. Visit the course links below to register. Contact ugwacord@yorku.ca for questions or to be added to the Listserv.
