New Jersey Struggles to Keep Dry After Rising Sea Levels

Provided by: WION |Published on: April 27, 2021

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Synopsis

This foreign news segment discusses the increased threat of flooding in New Jersey due to climate change.
Reporters specifically look at Ocean City and interview multiple residents including the mayor, a local activist, and an oceanic researcher.
Various economic factors of flooding are highlighted like clean-up costs, the effect on the real estate market, and government spending on flood control.

Subjects: Earth and Space Sciences, Economics, Geography

Authors: WION

Region: Jersey Shore

Languages: English

Positives

The video includes a variety of perspectives in the interviews.
It may be interesting for students to see how foreign news outlets cover climate change in the United States.

Prerequisites

Note that the nickname of New Jersey is "The Garden State." Rhode Island is nicknamed "The Ocean State."
This news segment is from an Indian English language news channel, and the accents of the reporters may be difficult for some students to understand.

Differentiation & Implementation

Students can research and design potential solutions to the challenges facing Ocean City as presented in the video.
Students can use this video as inspiration to create their own newscast that communicates the impacts of climate change in their city.
This video can be used in an economics course to discuss the cost-benefit analysis of paying to prevent flooding versus paying to clean up a flood or to explore climate change as a factor that can influence the real estate market.
In a geography course this video could be used to demonstrate how Ocean City's location and changing climate affect the settlement patterns there.
Cross-curricular connections can be made to civics courses by exploring the role of the mayor of Ocean City in this situation and what he is (or could be) doing to alleviate the threat of flooding.
Other resources about the economic costs of flooding include the video Changing Planet: Rising Sea Level and the video Youth Climate Story: The Financial Burden of Storms in North Carolina.
Other resources about flooding in New Jersey include this video about causes, this video about solutions, and this video about effects.

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