Be Flood Ready: GCSE students visit campus to learn about local flood risks
GCSE students from three local schools came onto campus to learn about the flood risks affecting Southampton.
Around 45 pupils from Wildern School, Regents Park Community College, and King Edward VI School took part in interactive workshops on Highfield Campus, learning some of the key methods and modelling techniques for assessing and adapting to flood risks.
The event was held by the More Than Maps team , a public engagement initiative in the School of Geography and Environmental Science which aims to empower young people in climate change adaptation.
Sien Van De Plank , Senior Research Fellow in School of Geography and Environmental Science, said: “In this case, local schools are learning not about the research findings of the work that we do in Geography, but the actual methods and how we find out what we know about the world.
“A lot of our topics are around hazards and climate change, and obviously young people are going to be the most impacted by those, so it’s really important to us in that sharing the ways that we study those hazards, they can be part of the solution.”
Students first drew homes that were adapted to deal with flood risks, with some choosing stilts and other modifications, while others placed houses high on hills.
They then created a Story Map using software ArcGIS – researching and sharing information about flood risk, warnings and preparedness in Southampton to produce a flood guide resource.
In the second workshop they focused on how people experience and respond to flooding, acting as local councillors trying to adapt to flooding events affecting their fictional towns.
Second year PhD student Lily Sharp coordinated the workshop.
“We are learning how to map flood risk and how to manage flooding. This is something that is happening now and affecting Southampton, and sometimes there’s a bit of optimism bias where people don’t think it’s going to happen to them.
“A lot of people don’t know how to adapt to flooding and they don’t know much about flood risk so hopefully we’ll get a bit of intergenerational learning going on - they are going to go home and speak to their peers and their parents and show them the flood guides that they have created.”
It’s estimated that around 6.3 million properties in England are at risk from flooding, which is predicted to rise to 8 million – or 1 in 4 – by 2050.
Southampton is at risk from several flooding events. Tidal flooding during high tides and storm surges poses the greatest flood risk, with approximately 10 per cent of the city being identified as at risk.
Toby Ware, Geography Teacher at Wildern School said: “This event links strongly to what we teach them but also the cultural capital element in that they are learning about Southampton, which is a big focus of our school.
“We are learning about all these far-away concepts but actually for them to see that it’s affecting them ten minutes away in their local area too is really valuable to them.”
The Be Flood Ready event took place as part of the Festival of Social Science , an annual celebration of research and knowledge about humans and society funded by the UKRI Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) .