#ISSS2016 Boulder

2946  Systems Literacy is a coordinated ongoing effort to create a greater awareness and understanding about “Systems” in society, schools and universities and engineering and to develop a comprehensive set of big ideas, supporting concepts and learning progressions. This Plenary is an invitation to join this initiative throughout the conference and beyond.

The presentation will describe the work completed in the past 12 months since this project began at last year’s ISSS Annual conference in Berlin 2015. The International Society for Systems Sciences is partnered with the International Council on Systems Engineering (INCOSE) and the International Federation for Systems Research (IFSR) to develop Systems Literacy. In 2000 work began at the National Geographic to encourage geographic literacy. This work progressed with the support of U.S. Government agencies such as the National Science Foundation, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NASA, Department of Energy, Department of Interior and many varied not for profit and educational organizations, to embrace projects on ocean literacy, earth science literacy, atmospheric literacy, climate literacy and energy literacy. These subject areas are a good foundation and models for exploring how Systems Literacy can be a path towards realizing sustainable futures.  The specific case of the Ocean Literacy project will be described as a model for Systems Literacy.  It was started in 2004 and has now influenced US Ocean Policy, the development of the recently published Next Generation Science Standards and now European Union sponsored projects on ocean literacy in Europe. A similar aspiration and challenge for Systems Literacy will be described. Connections to other conference plenaries and the themes of this conference will be made. Learning opportunities and ways to contribute will be outlined. A look forward to Plenary X will be made with the intent of building a richer picture of the Systems Literacy project development possibilities and plans by the Friday of the conference.