Lecture sparked curiosity and engagement in climate research
SMHI's climate research unit invited participants to Research Friday 2025 (that is part of the European Researchers' Night) in Norrköping and online. Students, teachers, and interested parties had the opportunity to meet researchers, ask questions, and visualize future climate-adapted societies.
The audience participates in a lecture on climate research during Research Friday 2025.
A total of around 80 people took part, mainly upper secondary school and folk high school students, but also teachers and others. The event was made possible thanks to the research projects TipESM, Climateurope2, OptimESM, and AI4PEX.
During an interactive lecture, participants learned how climate models work and how SMHI works in national and international projects. Researchers Renate Wilcke, Petter Lind, Yi-Chi Wang, Gustav Strandberg, Joakim Kjellsson, Nikki Brown, and Iréne Lake participated on stage, while Miranda Gatti Ståhl and Lindha Nilsson coordinated the event and took care of the audience.
During the break, a quiz was organized with questions about climate developed within the OptimESM project to be asked to students around Europe, as Research Friday is part of European Researchers' Night. In the afternoon, the workshop Framtidsbilder (Images of the Future) was held, where a small group illustrated future climate-adapted societies.
There was a lot of cutting and pasting during the workshop Framtidsbilder (Images of the Future).
- It was really fun to meet such an interested audience during both the lecture and the workshop. We have received very positive feedback and already had a request to visit one of the folk high schools. Research Friday is a fantastic opportunity to show how research is conducted, and hopefully we have inspired the next generation of climate researchers, says Miranda Gatti Ståhl, communications officer and organizer of Research Friday at SMHI.
During the week, there was also a "Borrow a Researcher" event, where three SMHI researchers met students both on site and online. One of them, climate researcher Klaus Wyser, says:
- It was an exciting experience, both for me and certainly also for the pupils and students I met. I received positive feedback from both pupils and teachers, and it was fun to share my knowledge, especially about the natural sciences, physics, and mathematics behind climate scenarios.