CU Boulder Joins Forces to Co-Host Global Climate Summit in Oxford

After hosting the 2022 Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Summit, CU Boulder remains a committed educational partner as a co-host of the global event, which will be held at the University of Oxford June 4–7, 2025, with major universities participating worldwide.

The Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights (UN Human Rights) and the University of Oxford, Right Here, Right Now’s Academic Partner, will bring together renowned experts and leaders, policymakers, technologists, academics and universities, celebrities and more to advance climate justice through human rights solutions to the climate crisis.

The University of Oxford will coordinate with universities around the world, including CU Boulder, as they host climate-related programs over four days. The summit will also ignite a global dialogue on June 5, 2025—UN World Environment Day—with a 24-hour global plenary broadcast live across every time zone. The initiative is being launched nine months in advance of the 2025 Right Here, Right Now Global Summit to ensure participants, media and the public have ample time to engage, paving the way for meaningful progress.

In a critical move to galvanize global action and summit support, this week UN Human Rights and the Right Here, Right Now celebrity coalition, including social justice icon Billie Jean King, Barbra Streisand, Carole King, Annie Lennox, Neil Young, Ziggy Marley, Pierce Brosnan, Jack Black, Laura Pausini, Rachel Platt, Kyra Sedgwick, Margaret Cho and more, united in a social media blitz with urgent messages expected to reach a collective audience of more than 150 million followers.

“As the global partner of the Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Alliance, UN Human Rights is grateful to the University of Oxford, co-host universities worldwide, and the International Universities Climate Alliance, for their commitment to work with us to advance human rights solutions to prevent, minimize and remedy the human suffering caused by the climate crisis,” said Astrid van Genderen Stort, UN Human Rights, Chief External Engagement and Partnerships.

The approach to the summit marks a paradigm shift in how international gatherings and global collaboration can thrive while minimizing the carbon footprint of traditional travel.

The main event, the 24-hour global plenary coordinated by International Universities Climate Alliance, will be co-hosted by the University of Cape Town, CU Boulder, Monash University, University of Nairobi, University of Oxford, University of São Paulo, UNSW Sydney and more, and will include live and virtual lectures, keynote speeches and panel discussions. Academic institutions will transform into hubs of climate consciousness, hosting “watch parties” and local co-host activities, uniting their communities in this historic exchange of ideas.

CU Boulder hosted the inaugural Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Summit in December 2022. Some 4,300 people representing 99 countries attended both in-person and virtually, engaging in passionate conversations about the often devastating impacts of climate change around the world on vulnerable populations, and how to identify potential pathways to equitable solutions.

“The University of Colorado Boulder is proud to have been the inaugural host and now a co-host of the Americas for this important global climate summit,” said CU Boulder Chancellor Justin Schwartz. “As a world leader in climate science research, we are honored to be amongst the world’s top universities that will leverage the knowledge of our faculty experts and youth to address the global climate crisis.”

Building on the Right Here, Right Now Human Rights Climate Commitments recently unveiled by UN Human Rights, CU Boulder, and global experts at COP28 in Dubai, the 2025 Right Here, Right Now Global Climate Summit aims to set a new benchmark in the global fight for climate justice with a forum designed to address the following objectives:

• Advance human rights solutions to the climate crisis
• Celebrate and elevate the voices of environmental human-rights defenders
• Reinforce and bring together key elements of the global climate justice movement while minimizing carbon footprint
• Empower and inspire people, especially students, as agents for climate justice now, and in future careers

“We are thrilled to have the opportunity to host this pivotal summit with UN Human Rights, bringing together leaders in human rights and climate research from around the world, across a wide range of disciplines with the common goal of finding solutions to one of the most pressing issues of our times, climate change,” said Professor Irene Tracey, vice chancellor of the University of Oxford.