STEM for the Sustainable Development Goals

The project developed six sets of teaching materials for Danish high schools in chemistry, biology and biotechnology. Each set of teaching materials was developed using a a systematic approach based on 1) a mapping of relevant curricula, 2) demand analyses for each topic and didactics among 100 high school teachers, 3) selection of relevant marine topics 4) development of materials by pairs of highschool teachers and PhD students, 5) courses for high school teachers on new research and how to teach using the newly developed materials, organised together wth the national ministry for education and research.The topic of each set of teaching materials are as follows:
1) Production of mussels (low trophic aquaculture) to combat eutrophication and production of sustainable food
2) Restoration of native oyster populations in Northern Europe informed by bioinformatics
3) Changes in polar biodiversity
4) Understanding ocean colour through spectroscopy
5) Production of sustainable feed for aquaculture (using insects), to reduce demand for wild caught fish
6) Production of sustainable feed for aquaculture made from side streams of beer production 3 In addition all materials was supported by engaging videos with the young researchers produced by professional media companies. The project was later extensively evaluated in clases by an external evaluators from the University of Copenhagen, with great results. The project estimates that somewhere between 7000-17000 high school students are likely to be educated with these materials over the coming years, based on the use of materials on the website. The action is being followed up by new material development in several Horizon projects including e.g. BlueMissionBANOS and OceanICU.