A Performance Evaluation of Environmental Education Regional Centers: Positioning of Roles and Reflections on Expertise Development

Yu-Long Chao

doi:10.3390/su12062501

Abstract

Emulating the practice of regional centers for expertise on education for sustainable development, a new type of environmental education (EE) centers with a multi-county jurisdiction was established in Taiwan. Reflections on the functional roles and EE expertise are crucial for these EE regional centers after implementing initiatives while trying to lead environmental educators. The operation team members of these centers and the practitioners and educators from EE institutions, facilities, and venues in Taiwan all participated in this investigation on the roles of these centers and evaluated their performance. Results show that at this initial stage of EE regional center development, the mixed views of center operation teams were averaged into a position close to the mean between a practice-orientated and a strategy-orientated methodology on a spectrum of the center roles. The evaluation results revealed a certain insufficiency in the experiences and expertise in EE of some EE regional centers. As these centers are endowed with a central status by policy to promote and guide regional EE, they need to learn from local grass-root environmental educators as well as other EE regional center personnel to substantiate their expertise, which could be achieved through practical experiences and co-research with local environmental educators.

Highlights

Year 2011 saw a significant milestone in the development of Taiwan’s environmental education (EE), as the Environmental Education Act was enacted to engage more citizens in acquiring knowledge about, forming the ethical values of, and taking actions for the environment that are fundamental, in the shifting toward sustainable development
The Act prescribes the certification of educators, institutions, facilities, and venues in EE, among which the environmental education institutions are established to train persons to be certified as environmental education personnel; the environmental education facilities and venues are to provide venues where a variety of EE programs for the public take place; and the environmental education personnel are to be responsible for the EE practices of their organizations including schools, governmental departments, state-owned enterprises, and the certified EE institutions and facilities/venues
In the evaluation on EE regional center performance made by the practitioners and educators from EE institutions, facilities and venues in each region, the performance levels of the four centers varied noticeably

Summary

Introduction

Year 2011 saw a significant milestone in the development of Taiwan’s environmental education (EE), as the Environmental Education Act was enacted to engage more citizens in acquiring knowledge about, forming the ethical values of, and taking actions for the environment that are fundamental, in the shifting toward sustainable development. There have been centers with titles including the terms either “environmental education” or “nature education” across the country since 1988 [1]. These range from the Environmental Education Centers established by the Ministry of Education in normal universities or universities of education and missioned to provide EE workshops for school teachers and organize campus EE activities; the Nature Education Centers of the Bureau of Forestry that provide nature-based EE programs to the public; and the Environmental Education Centers founded by city or county governments, most of which function as exhibition venues of EE media for citizens. As environmental awareness increases in Taiwan society [2] and the EE Act creates momentum for the implementation of EE initiatives in schools and organizations, numerous EE practitioners and environmental educators have taken part in education in, about, and for the environment in different places, with multiple approaches

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Discussion

Conclusion