International Summer School on Geography and Sustainability 2026
Frontiers in Telecoupling and Metacoupling Research for Addressing Global Sustainability Challenges
Date: August 9-16, 2026
Location: Beijing Normal University, China & online
Website: http://igu-geosus.org/pages/telecoupling-summer-school.html
Language: English
Target audience: Master’s students, PhD students, Postdocs, and other researchers.
1 Organization
Host: Beijing Normal University (BNU)
Organizer: Faculty of Geographical Science, BNU
Support journal: Geography and Sustainability
2 About the Summer School
Theme：Frontiers in Telecoupling and Metacoupling Research for Addressing Global Sustainability Challenges
Telecoupling refers to human-nature (or socioeconomic-environmental) interactions over distances. Metacoupling encompasses telecoupling, as well as interactions between adjacent systems (pericoupling) and within systems (intracoupling). Telecoupling and metacoupling are increasingly shaping global sustainability challenges, including biodiversity loss, climate change, pollution, and the degradation of ecosystem services and natural resources, such as land and water.
The International Summer School focuses on telecoupling and metacoupling research to address global sustainability challenges, aligning with global priorities such as the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the Kunming-Montreal Global Biodiversity Framework, the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, the UNFCCC Paris Agreement, and the Climate Change meeting at COP 30 in Brazil. In addition to lectures, participants will have opportunities to discuss and work on team-based research projects on telecoupling or metacoupling to enhance learning and likely lead to high-quality publications. Participants can choose research projects related to telecoupling/metacoupling or have them suggested by instructors, and projects may continue beyond the summer school because publishing research often takes more time. (Research projects at similar training programs in the past have resulted in many high-quality publications in outlets such as Science.) The lecturing topics include:
- Telecoupling and metacoupling frameworks
- Applications of the telecouipling and metacoupling frameworks
- Methods and tools for operationalizing the telecoupling and metacoupling frameworks
- Future directions of telecoupling and metacoupling research for addressing global sustainability challenges
- Writing high-quality papers
3 Agenda
August 9 (Sunday): Registration
August 10-14 (Monday-Friday): Lectures/ Projects/Discussion
August 15 (Saturday): Participant Presentations/Discussion
August 16 (Sunday): Departure
