Faced by the intensification of climate change and the increase in heat waves and pollution, many initiatives are being launched around the world to "green" cities and make them more resilient (Bowler et al., 2010). Among them, the greening of schoolyards is developing in many cities. In addition to reduce the urban heat island effect and runoff, these actions are also designed to address socio-spatial inequalities in access to nature, whose deleterious effects on the well-being and health of city dwellers have been revealed by the COVID-19 pandemic.
However, little attention has been given to the potential contribution of these new vegetated areas to urban biodiversity and to human-animal-environment relations. It thus seemed important to us to put biodiversity issues back at the heart of schoolyard greening operations, by questioning both the functionality of these new vegetated areas as habitats and corridors for wildlife and their role on the perception of biodiversity among students and their teachers.
The Master's degree Espace & Milieux of Université de Paris, in association with researchers in geography and biology from the UMR LADYSS and LIED as well as the city of Paris, has been working on this issue for three years. The place of biodiversity, and in particular of insects, in these operations is analyzed through a combination of different approaches: entomological inventories, mapping of tree cover, spatial modeling of ecological networks, surveys by questionnaire and interview. Recently, this work took on a European dimension through the COOLSCHOOLS project (2022-2024), which aims to examine how schoolyard greening operations, primarily designed to address climate issues, can contribute to biodiversity conservation, the well-being of pupils and residents, social justice and quality education. Geographical work on biodiversity will thus be crossed and put into perspective with research in sociology, medicine, and educational science.
Mots clés : urban biodiversity |Insects|interdisciplinary approach
A103073CC