Why Infrastructure?
How do California's infrastructures affect economic possibilities, the environment, and day-to-day life in our state? How do our infrastructures influence our relations with each other, within and beyond California? What can an exploration of infrastructures in other parts of the world teach us about ourselves? Finally, will our current infrastructures help us thrive in the future?
Infrastructure is a useful lens through which to examine history, culture, sociological phenomena, geography, environment, potential climate change impacts, globalization, and much more.
Infrastructure-related Lessons
We invite you to explore, adapt, and use these lessons! In each folder, you'll find a comprehensive lesson plan along with all necessary slides, handouts, and links to external resources. While some lessons are classroom-ready for any teacher to use, others are location-specific and will require editing to apply to your local circumstance. You'll also find suggestions for teacher-learning.
Explore Infrastructure-related Lessons
Project Funding
Infrastructure: California and the World was made possible by support from the California Global Education Project, which is part of California’s State Subject Matter Project. Additional support came from UC Berkeley's Office of Resources for International and Area Studies (ORIAS) and the area studies centers and institutes at UC Berkeley.
About the 2025-2026 Program
Infrastructure: California and the World was a working group for middle and high school teachers interested in a sustained study of California infrastructure systems. It was an extension of the 2025 ORIAS Summer Institute, Infrastructure and Society. After their year of study, participants each produced a multi-day interactive lesson, unit, or assessment to teach about infrastructure in their own school context.