Student Example: Population Growth and Gender Equity

Summary: After an in-depth exploration of the Ecological Footprint guided by Creative Change curricula, a freshman high school student documented the relationship between gender equity and population growth. The project emphasized how education, nutrition, and health care for women can reduce fertility rates, and examined the policies affecting low-income women's access to these critical needs. The analysis highlighted the relationship between population growth and poverty and ways that lack of resources (health care, education, etc.) can increase fertility rates. This analysis focuses on gender equity and human rights, and debunks the simplistic assumption that people are poor because they have "too many" children.

Some of the concepts and skills addressed by this activity:

• explaining causes of important global problems
• identifying factors that affect population growth and change
• analyzing data and drawing conclusions
• communicating information through graphic representations
• creating information for an authentic audience

Learn more about our Ecological Footprint program and how to engage your students in effective learning about these issues.