Scaling Climate Literacy: Lessons from Colorado’s Seal Implementation Hackathon

As Colorado is the first state to enact the Seal of Climate Literacy Diploma Endorsement, district and school leaders are illuminating what it takes to implement the Seal at scale across various contexts - from sprawling urban districts with dozens of high schools, to small rural districts with a handful (and sometimes just one) high school. 

These leaders are paving the way, revealing implementation strategies and best practices that can be applied in not just other contexts, but other states as well. Lyra is building a vibrant ecosystem that empowers these leaders to connect, collaborate, and inspire one another. 

Lyra, in partnership with Franklin Street Studio, hosted a recent convening of leaders implementing the Seal of Climate Literacy in their communities, called the Seal of Climate Literacy Implementation Hackathon. The goal of the Hackathon was to empower attendees to return to their educational communities with fresh ideas, strategies, and momentum to inspire and strengthen their own implementation efforts. 

The event took place at the beginning of the school year, and was attended by educators and school leaders from four large urban school districts and four smaller, more rural school districts, representing regions across the state. 

Some of the attending districts implemented the Seal in its first year as state law, while others are adopting it for the first time in its second year - creating an ideal blend of experienced leaders ready to share their insights and new leaders eager to learn.

In its first full school year as state law in Colorado, the Seal of Climate Literacy Diploma Endorsement was implemented by more than a dozen Local Education Providers (school districts, charter networks, and schools) across the state, including in rural and urban areas. Preliminary data suggests that more than 420 students were conferred the Seal (more data will be available from the Colorado Department of Education in Fall 2025). Many of the attendees at the Hackathon received grant funding from Lyra to accelerate the implementation of the Seal in their communities - read more about the implementation grant fund here. 

Dr. Karen Cheser works on her Portrait of Progress for Durango 9-R.

Learning from three strong implementers through “Lightning Talks”

The Seal of Climate Literacy has been implemented differently across the state, which is to be expected as the legislation in Colorado hands autonomy to Local Education Providers to choose climate literacy standards, approve courses, and set specific requirements for student projects. 

First, Erin Greenwood, the Science Coordinator and the lead Seal implementer from Boulder Valley School District (a large urban district), shared about the district’s strategy for engaging students early-on through the district’s Green Youth Council. In this council, students from across the district regularly convened to plan and support the implementation of the Seal across the district. Ms. Greenwood shared that getting students involved early in the process was key.

Second, Dr. Karen Cheser, the Superintendent of Durango School District 9-R (a rural district), shared about how the Seal fits into the district’s broader Ikigai strategy, where they aim to help students find pathways that blend what they love, what they are good at, what the world needs, and what they can be paid for. Dr. Cheser shared that the Seal is not just “another thing”, but part of their DNA as a district that values sustainability, care for the environment, and resilience. 

Third, CeXochitl DeLaTorre, an educator at Alameda High School in Jefferson County Public Schools (part of a large urban district), shared about how she piloted the Seal at her school, including launching a river ecology monitoring program for her students and expanding its accessibility to linguistically diverse students. Ms. DeLaTorre illustrated that educators can be at the helm of implementation within their schools.

From there, the district and school leaders had the opportunity to engage in more intimate conversations with the presenters based on what they were interested in learning more about. Additionally, the three lightning talk speakers, all experienced Seal implementers, shared practical advice and words of wisdom to the new implementers. 

After, everyone came together as a full group to share key takeaways from their conversations. Two takeaways were that (1) students can and should be leaders in the implementation process, and that (2) a successful strategy is integrating the Seal into curricula/coursework so that students can automatically earn the Seal, rather than having them apply for it separately from their coursework. 

Highlighting successful design choices through “Portraits of Progress”

Next, experienced implementers had the opportunity to create “A Portrait of Progress” that told the story of how the Seal was successful for students in the first year of implementation and the design choices that led to that success. They shared why the Seal matters to their students, how they intentionally designed the implementation process to meet the needs of their students, three big wins, and one tension point as they enter their second year of implementation.

Each portrait was displayed on a poster in a science-fair style, and all district and school leaders in attendance had the opportunity to view them, leaving feedback on sticky notes using the prompts “I notice”, “I wonder”, and “I could borrow”. 

From there, the whole group came back together to discuss emerging takeaways from the Portraits of Progress, which included the importance of (1) making the implementation process sustainable in years to come, (2) integrating the Seal into school-wide or district-wide initiatives, (3) tracking student progress throughout the year, (4) engaging parents and families, and (5) building a strong culture around the Seal for students. 

Thinking through challenges and setting goals through “Action Planning”

Next, the group had designated time to work on an action plan, where they could reflect on previous or anticipated design challenges, hatch a plan to overcome these challenges, get feedback from peers, and refine their plan, making sure they’d leave with key actions to bring back to their communities. School and district leaders in their second year of implementation focused on making the implementation of the Seal sustainable for years to come, integrating climate literacy into non-science courses to expand offerings to students, and scaling up so that more students could earn the Seal in future years. School and district leaders in their first year of implementation focused on how to build up momentum around the Seal, including getting the right stakeholders involved at various levels. 

Next, the whole group engaged in resource sharing. The Lyra team shared resources that they have designed based on the opportunities and challenges that arose during the first year of implementation, and other experienced implementers offered up their resources as well, including lists of student projects, rubrics, course lists, and more! 

Taking New Ideas and Bringing Them Home

As the day wrapped up, a few clear themes stood out. District leaders emphasized the importance of peer networks - not just for sharing ideas, but for sustaining momentum long after events like this one. While large districts leaned into building scalable systems to reach more students, smaller districts found power in more personal approaches: tapping into passionate champions and letting student voices lead the way.

A shift in thinking around student engagement also emerged. Instead of relying on out-of-school experiences to engage students in projects around local climate issues, many are now weaving hands-on learning directly into the classroom - meeting students where they are and making deeper learning part of the everyday. Perhaps most energizing of all, the Hackathon sparked tangible next steps, with district leaders and educators walking away not just inspired, but equipped with ideas they’re ready to pilot back home.

What’s Next?

The peer networking and collaboration at the Hackathon further illustrated that many district and school leaders implementing the Seal are looking for connections to share learnings with. The Lyra team will remain creative and opportunistic, thinking through ways in which the group could come back together again. Additionally, the Lyra team is interested in elevating learnings from this group and sharing them with a more national audience so that leaders in other states have something to build off of when implementing the Seal in their own contexts.  

Next, the brilliant ideas from the passionate leaders in the room revealed the need for an implementation playbook- that is, some type of resource where current and new Seal implementers can learn from one another’s approaches while being guided. This is in the works - stay tuned!