Leveraging the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals Artwork

Fund for Teachers - The Podcast

Fund for Teachers is a national nonprofit that awards grants for self-designed fellowships to America's most innovative preK-12 teachers. This is a podcast to elevate these public/private/charter school educators as inspiring architects of their careers, classrooms and school communities.

All Episodes

Fund for Teachers - The Podcast

Leveraging the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals

June 25, 2026 • Carrie Caton • Season 7 • Episode 2

0:00 | 26:46

In 2015, United Nations member states adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) designed to end poverty, protect the planet, and create a more prosperous future for all by 2030. Together, these goals address some of humanity’s most urgent challenges, including hunger, poverty, gender equality, health and well-being, and climate change. As then-UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon famously stated, “There is no ‘Plan B’ because we do not have a ‘Planet B.’ We have to work and galvanize our action.”

Fund for Teachers Fellow Bryan Peters couldn’t agree more.

At Mathers High School—the most diverse campus in Chicago Public Schools, where students represent more than 140 nations and speak over 60 languages—Bryan uses the UN Sustainable Development Goals as a framework for teaching recent immigrants and refugees. To deepen this work and empower students to see themselves as changemakers, he designed a Fund for Teachers fellowship exploring social and environmental sustainability initiatives across urban and rural Brazil. Along the way, he sought insights and inspiration to bring back to his classroom—and we caught up with him in the heart of the Amazon Rainforest.

Learn more about Fund for Teachers on our Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn pages and apply for YOUR self-designed fellowship at fundforteachers.org.

Music on podcast: Scott Harris: Clear Progress