Signal to Noise: Messages from the Arctic (and Australia)

Our story has changed since we began - with global travel limited by Covid 19, the study tour has been postponed. However, the students will turn their focus to the climate change emergency until we have clearance to arrange a trip for next year. This will allow us to even more closely connect climate crises across the globe.While Australia is experiencing unprecedented and devastating fires and drought as an immediate result of climate change, the melting of the polar caps has had a slow and continuous effect on the weather patterns of the world. The Arctic is warming at double the pace of anywhere else on Earth and, for this reason, is a leading indicator of global warming, from melting glaciers and permafrost thaw, to starving polar bears and growing homelessness in local communities. Its remoteness can cause us to overlook its critical relationship to the global environment. Mid 2021, ten of Griffith University’s brightest and passionate students will bear witness to climate change impacts in the Arctic, documenting how melting polar ice caps lead to cataclysmic effects around the world.Travelling with Nobel co-Laureates and expert arctic guides, Adjunct Professor John Rodsted and Mette Eliseussen, 10 students will fund their own travel to Svalbard, Norway to embark on a 12 day sail (June 26 - July 7, 2020) through the Earth’s northern seas. Two lecturers from communication/journalism and photojournalism will represent the university and round out the teaching team.The focus is not an investigation of the sciences of climate change, but rather how we can most effectively communicate its impacts. We consider the Arctic the climate change signal that is drowned out by the noise of competing politics, industry, and misinformation.This trip highlights the connectedness of climate change around the globe. And this podcast will document our journey.