Eton College’s Co-Director of Environmental Education, Pauline Herbommez, will travel to Antarctica with the Villars Institute on their two-week Ice Station Expedition this December.
Selected for her exceptional work in educating young people about the environment and climate change, Pauline is “deeply honoured” and plans to use this unique opportunity to encourage global awareness around preserving Antarctica and ensuring that the Antarctic Treaty continues to protect it beyond 2041.
“Our mission is to nurture empathy through education and empower action. I believe caring for our students means caring for their habitat,” she said.
Described by expedition leader and polar explorer Dr Robert Swan as “the last great wilderness left”, the team will be based in an ice station 600 nautical miles from the South Pole. Along with two Villars Fellows, Pauline will be sharing insights and discoveries with schools across the globe, through social media and blog posts to help make Antarctica feel “real, tangible, and relevant”.
During the two weeks, they will be testing innovative renewable energy technologies to discourage financial incentive to exploit Antarctica for fossil fuels, and contribute to research on the eco and climate systems, employing their diverse skillsets and backgrounds.
When Pauline returns from the expedition, she plans to raise awareness around the conservation of Antarctica through her role as a teacher. “I think education is key for preserving our planet and reconnecting with nature,” she explains.
Pauline’s drive to fight climate change through education was sparked on a trip to Australia, when she realised that future generations wouldn’t have the chance to see coral reefs if climate change continued to destroy the ecosystem.
In the classroom, she plans to embed Antarctica into the PSHE curriculum and ensure the lessons learnt on the expedition are taught year after year. Quoting Senegalese forestry engineer Baba Dioum, she said: “In the end, we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand, and we will understand only what we are taught.”
While the Amazon is often described as the ‘lungs’ of the planet, for Pauline, Antarctica is Earth’s ‘memory’. She said: “The ice preserves records of Earth’s climate going back hundreds of thousands of years, teaching us about the planet’s history. They also reflect back the consequence of our actions, reminding us of the urgency to act for our future.”
Storing 90% of the volume glacier ice on the planet, Pauline stressed the importance of studying and preserving the continent: “The future of Antarctica is also the future of global sea level change… we must understand it.”
