In mehreren nationalen Lehrplänen werden Themen im Zusammenhang mit Klima, Entwicklung und Nachhaltigkeit zunehmend in den Mittelpunkt gerückt. Daher ist das Wissen um die Nutzung von Satellitenbildern im Klassenzimmer zur Überwachung unseres Planeten von großem Nutzen für den täglichen Unterricht und zur Ergänzung vieler Lernziele.

The Great Disaster Challenge is an educational programme that uses Copernicus Earth observation data for disaster management. It was launched by a consortium of eleven European countries and is being implemented simultaneously in Austria, Bulgaria, Cyprus, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Germany, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Romania and Spain. The aim is to inspire pupils (aged around 13-16) and teachers to use and better understand the Copernicus programme and the possibilities of Earth observation.

The Copernicus programme is not currently widely used for educational purposes at secondary school level, so this project has the potential to reach a relatively new user segment. The co-operative nature of the challenge is designed to create a network of young citizens connected on an international level. The teaching material prepared for the event and the use cases developed by the students can later be reused for educational purposes. The impact on user adoption has both an immediate and a long-term component: By familiarising teachers with Copernicus data, many new users will be created during and after the event, and the participating students will bring the knowledge to future projects at universities and in their future careers.