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FROM INSPIRATION TO ANCHORING: A LONG-TERM TEACHER SUPPORT IN THE IMPLEMENTATION OF CLIMATE EDUCATION IN SCHOOLS

Climate change education (CCE) is increasingly recognised as an essential part of contemporary schooling, yet its systematic implementation in Czech schools remains uneven. Teachers and schools routinely encounter implementation barriers such as limited time and workload pressures, curriculum and assessment constraints, uncertainty regarding both content and pedagogy, and variable institutional support. In response, long-term teacher-support programmes that combine professional learning, peer exchange and mentoring are often promoted as a promising pathway. However, there is still a need for process-oriented evidence explaining how programme support translates into everyday school practice and under what conditions this translation becomes sustainable. This study examines the long-term teacher-support project “Klima se mění a my s ním” (Czech Republic) and seeks to explain the mechanisms and conditions that enable the embedding of climate change education in school practice. It addresses three research questions: (1) Which mechanisms facilitate the transfer of programme support into everyday school practice (teaching, routines, collegial collaboration)? (2) Which barriers and contextual conditions shape this transfer? (3) What implications follow for the design of long-term teacher-support interventions in CCE? The study follows a qualitatively dominant, formative evaluation design with a small, complementary quantitative indicator. The qualitative dataset consists of six semi-structured interviews with participating teachers from project schools and programme documentation describing the intervention logic, phases and support components. Interviews focused on participants’ experiences of the support model, perceived benefits and weaknesses, transfer into classroom teaching and broader school practice, barriers, sustainability, and recommendations.  A small quantitative “window” is included from one participating school (pre–post student survey on climate self-efficacy and student satisfaction with a school-based programme component) and is interpreted as indicative rather than generalisable. Qualitative analysis followed Strauss and Corbin’s grounded theory procedures (open, axial and selective coding; constant comparison; attention to negative cases). Coding progressed from incident-level codes to higher-order categories and their properties/dimensions, culminating in an integrative core category capturing the central process across cases. Trustworthiness was supported through (a) triangulation with programme documentation, (b) analytic memoing and an audit trail of category development, (c) systematic cross-case comparison, and (d) extensive use of verbatim excerpts to substantiate interpretations. Findings converge in an integrative model whose core category is embedding climate change education in a workload-compatible school practice. Embedding does not appear to be a direct outcome of training participation alone; rather, it unfolds through the development of concrete enabling forms and the strengthening of collective practice within schools. A central concept emerging from the data is that of school anchors—defined here as tangible, repeatable forms (routines, programme formats, spaces, artefacts, audit practices, shared resources) that make climate education visible, shareable and sustainable in daily school life. In this paper, the term anchoring is used only as a metaphor for the creation of such school anchors; analytically, the focal process is embedding in everyday practice. School anchors reduce the abstractness of climate issues by linking them to local contexts and actionable routines, and they support cross-curricular uptake by providing stable reference points for multiple subjects and teachers. Three enabling mechanisms stand out: Professional learning with high return on time—effective support combines peer exchange, active/practical formats, and explicit didactic translation (“what can be used in the classroom next week”). Mentoring as scaffolding for implementation design—mentoring helps teachers clarify goals, structure steps, access materials, and translate inspiration into feasible innovation under real constraints. Multi-stage diffusion within teaching staff—transfer beyond individual enthusiasts is most realistic when diffusion is staged (a shared introductory experience for the whole staff, followed by voluntary practice-oriented sessions for interested colleagues, supported by accessible materials and resources). Across cases, the most powerful barrier is the school time economy, functioning as a meta-barrier that shapes feasibility, continuity and sustainability. Workload pressures, substitution teaching, timetable constraints and competing priorities often determine whether support is used in time, whether reflection occurs, and whether innovations can be maintained. Teachers’ accounts point to an implementation burden (sometimes discussed as “transaction costs”) associated with planning, coordination, materials, and time. Sustainability emerges as a distinct phase of implementation: creating an anchor is often easier than maintaining it, which requires role distribution, routines of care, institutional recognition, and succession planning. The complementary quantitative indicator from one school showed a statistically significant increase in students’ climate self-efficacy with a moderate effect size and overall high student satisfaction with the programme component. These results are treated as indicative and used to contextualise the qualitative implementation model, not as evidence of overall project effectiveness across all schools. The findings support an implementation-oriented understanding of CCE: sustainable change depends less on isolated training and more on designing support that helps schools (a) produce school anchors and (b) develop collective practice under real constraints. Mentoring appears particularly effective as a mechanism for translating inspiration into workable innovation, yet it requires continuity and organisational robustness (predictable contact, clear milestones, and backup capacity). Implications for future programmes include: (1) building an early “translation phase” (facilitated ideation, identification of a realistic first step, and milestones), (2) actively engaging school leadership regarding mandate, workload and substitution arrangements, (3) reducing schools’ implementation burden through templates, ready-to-use materials and minimal viable formats, and (4) treating sustainability planning as an integral part of programme design rather than an afterthought.

Keywords: climate education; teacher professional development; long-term support; mentoring; grounded theory; evaluation