Climate and Sustainability Education Update

Learning happens in a wide range of ways, including university courses, studying for exams, attending webinars, earning microcredentials, serving on professional committees, working on projects in new areas or collaborating with academics. New areas of practice are sometimes referred to as “non-traditional”, though over time they become a standard part of actuarial work.

Climate and sustainability (referred to as “climate” here) is a growing practice area for actuaries as our skills in risk management, pricing, extreme events, economics and public policy are important to tackling the wide range of climate challenges our planet faces. Many current practitioners in this space were “self-taught” over many years, learning to apply actuarial techniques developed for other purposes to new climate problems.

The Institute, and the International Actuarial Association (IAA), are developing educational opportunities for members to make this process more efficient and structured as the need is clear.

Not only is there a dizzying volume of papers, webinars, and courses on offer, but the profession’s stakeholders are coming to expect that actuaries be both literate in the subject matter and be able to demonstrate competence through a more formal assessment process.

The Institute’s Climate and Sustainability Practice Committee (CPSC), in conjunction with the Education staff, has undertaken a project to develop a plan to upgrade our educational offerings to members in this key area.

The initial review included a survey of what other actuarial organisations and leading universities globally are doing in this area and what courses might be suitable for actuaries.

We identified topics which might be of interest to actuaries, such as:

• The basics of climate science
• Understanding physical, transition and liability risk
• Scenario analysis and systems thinking
• Key supranational organisations and what they do
• International frameworks for financial reporting, such as the ISSB
• Australian policy, including the new ASRS
• Climate finance, including carbon markets
• Adaptation
• Professionalism

We then reviewed various educational offerings plus papers from the IAA and organisations like the ISSB, looking for content which focused on areas like those above.

Our review identified several quality courses offered by other actuarial organisations and supranational entities. You can find a list of three shortlisted courses at the end of this article.

These courses have been shortlisted as options for consideration for qualified actuaries interested in working in climate risk and reporting. Time has been spent reviewing alternative courses against criteria, including that the course provides sound education materials, good coverage of some or all of the topics above and an assessment process to demonstrate capability. Note that the Institute is not endorsing or otherwise warranting these courses; we expect individual members will review the offerings and make decisions about their utility. These courses would qualify for CPD.

The review also identified other resources, such as papers or websites, which would allow a member to gain an understanding of key topics in self-study. We have placed these on the Learning Management System (LMS), including links to Insight Sessions on climate and sustainability topics. Over the next several months we will be building out the LMS to include additional materials and dividing the material into basic and advanced streams.

Longer term, the CPSC will be considering whether the Institute should create a microcredential in climate and/or develop a course. This would likely include a structured study program and an assessment process culminating with a recognised credential along the lines of CERA.

We will also be looking at whether the Institute might partner with universities or other professional organisations to provide educational content. We will be holding discussions with members to gauge their interest in this and want to incorporate input from a range of views.

Finally, we will also be looking into ways students can leverage their university years to take courses relevant to climate and sustainability and receive exemptions towards their actuarial qualification. Of course, this would need to be done in a way which does not dilute the current core focus on math and data science. But most universities have excellent resources in disciplines central to climate, including climate science, macroeconomics, and public policy.

We would welcome volunteers from the Institute’s membership to assist us with this effort. If you would like to know more or get involved, please contact Member Services.

Education is one of the core missions of the Institute, and we want to bring the best resources available to our members. Stay tuned for more reports as we progress our work this year.

Three publicly available courses that may be of interest to Actuaries working in climate risk and reporting:

CPD: Actuaries Institute Members can claim two CPD points for every hour of reading articles on Actuaries Digital.