Environmental Education Centers Research Articles

Reflection on the Implementation and Operation of the Anhanduí Ecological Park - Anhanduí Environmental Education Center in Campo Grande/MS

In facing urban expansion, actions were necessary, such as creating Urban Parks and Environmental Education Centers (CEAs), making them a reality in contemporary Brazil. In Campo Grande (MS), the public power created four CEAs in the 2010s, located in Linear Parks (Urban Parks), spaces rich in water sources, local flora, and fauna. This research aimed to identify the guidelines for implementing and operating the CEA Anhanduí and analyze the participatory activities advocated by the Municipal Environmental Education Program (PMEA) according to the current conservationist Environmental Education. The research found that the CEA has a physical structure, appropriate equipment, and a multitasking manager, but it still does not have a Pedagogical Political Project and a Sustainability Plan.

GEOCONSERVATION AND ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION AT GEOPARK ARARIPE (CEARÁ) THROUGH DIDACTIC WORKSHOPS AND FIELD CLASSES

Environmental Education can be developed from the perspective of the diversity of experiences, and commitments, which have in common the transformation of society through education. In this process of environmental awareness, it is developed in the school space, or outside it, which is contemplated as determined entities, as in geoparks, it proves to be decisive for the understanding of the individuals or environments that surround them. Thus, the objective of this study is to analyze and work on non-school environmental education as a strategy in the process of geoconservation of geosites in the Araripe Geopark. Among the results, we can see that the geopark, mainly through the interpretation and environmental education centers, develop activities such as workshops for replicas of fossils, bio-jewels, puppet theater and cloth book, in addition to ecological trail and holiday camp. Many are extraordinarily important actions for regional geoconservation, as they are not public actions in important actions still carried out for the geopark conservation area

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

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.

Comparison of the Regional Environmental Education Centers of Korea and Taiwan in Systems and Roles:Cases of the Gyeonggido Environmental Education Center and the Kao-Ping Environmental Education Center

Comparison of the Regional Environmental Education Centers of Korea and Taiwan in Systems and Roles:Cases of the Gyeonggido Environmental Education Center and the Kao-Ping Environmental Education Center

Centra environmentálního vzdělávání z pohledu učitelů

The study presents a survey conducted at the set of teachers (N=165) participating in the network for instructional support in environmental education M.R.K.R.V. and Mrkvička. The survey was focused on the meaning of the centers for the respondents and the reasons for choosing some of the offered services. The results suggest that teachers interpret the role of the environmental education centers as irreplaceable and that they highly appreciate the level of the offered services. They use mainly the short educational programs, they use their services repeatedly in a year, and their choice is based by their previous good experience, its cost, and distance. The study also discusses some of the issues associated with these results.

環境教育・環境学習拠点づくり

環境教育・環境学習拠点づくり

Gender and Racial Diversity in Environmental Organizations: Uneven Accomplishments and Cause for Concern

Abstract There is has been strong interest in the state of diversity in the environmental field for some time now. Recent studies have shown that gender diversity is progressing at a faster pace than racial diversity. This article reports on data collected from 324 mainstream environmental organizations in 2014. It examines gender and racial diversity in six different types of environmental organizations—general conservation organizations, freshwater organizations, environmental education centers, environmental consulting organizations, environmental policy institutes/think tanks, and professional conservation and trade associations. The study found that though females exceed males on the staff of environmental organizations, women are underrepresented in the top leadership echelons of the institutions. The study also found that minorities are underrepresented in all ranks of the staff and leadership of environmental organizations. The successes women have had in being hired into the environmental workfor...

20+ Years of Environmental Education Centers in Greece: Teachers’ Perceptions and Future Challenges

For the first time after decades of expansion and systematic innovative practice, environmental education in Greece faces an uncertain future as a result of the contemporary political and economic crisis. This research aims to contribute to the international exchange of good practices by focusing on the effects and functions of the Greek network of Environmental Education Centers. A nationwide survey suggests that Environmental Education Centers act as nuclei for the dissemination of environmental education leading to projects that are associated with multiple benefits for participating students.

Foreword

vii Foreword Research in Outdoor Education (ROE), the official journal of the Coalition for Education in the Outdoors, is a peer-reviewed, scholarly journal seeking to support and further outdoor education and its goals, including personal growth and moral development, team building and cooperation, outdoor knowledge and skill development, environmental awareness, education and enrichment, and research that directly supports systematic assessment and/ or evidence-based advances in outdoor education. The journal is intended to appeal to researchers, practitioners, teachers, and post-secondary students through the exploration and discussion of diverse perspectives on the theoretical , empirical, and practical aspects of outdoor education in its broadest sense. Research in Outdoor Education aims to: 1. Improve the understanding of outdoor education through the critical examination of issues, trends, practices and conceptualizations of outdoor education in contemporary society. 2. Disseminate and unite current outdoor education research and theories and their implications and applications for practice in a wide range of contexts . 3. Offer a medium through which practitioners, researchers, and students can exchange and debate ideas and research. 4. Complement the existing body of knowledge related to outdoor education. The Coalition for Education in the Outdoors is a nonprofit network of outdoor and environmental education centers, nature centers, conservation and recreation organizations, outdoor education and experiential education associations , institutions of higher learning, public and private schools, fish and wildlife agencies, and businesses that share a mission: the support and furtherance of outdoor education and its goals. Founders believed the Coalition would fill a need in the outdoor education community for an organization that “would unite outdoor associations, institutions, businesses, and agencies to better serve both professionals and consumers in the outdoors.” Beginning with this 2015 issue (volume 13), Dr. Tim O’Connell and Dr. Garrett Hutson from Brock University have assumed the role of co-editors of ROE. We, and the Coalition for Education in the Outdoors Research Committee , wish to extend a heartfelt thank you to past editor, Alan Ewert, and assistant editor, Yun Chang for their leadership and strengthening of the journal. Due to their efforts and vision, ROE continues to publish high-quality research viii studies related to education in the out-of-doors. We also wish to extend a thank you to Sagamore Publishing for its continued support, development, and refinement of ROE. Volume 13 contains four articles for your reading and thinking enjoyment. The issue starts with a paper from past ROE editor, Alan Ewert, titled “The Use of Biomarkers in Outdoor Education Research: Promises, Challenges, and the Development of Evidence.” This paper argues that biomarkers such as cortisol may be another important type of data that can broaden outdoor education research. The second paper by Jeremy Jostad, Jim Sibthorp, Mandy Pohja, and John Gookin is titled “The Adolescent Social Group in Outdoor Adventure Education: Social Connections That Matter.” This paper investigates how students from 22 different National Outdoor Leadership School (NOLS) courses connected socially with their groups as well as what factors influence those connections. The third paper, by Tracy Mainieri and Denise Anderson, is titled “‘There Was More Out There than Our Street’: Exploring Summer Camp Programming as a Context to Foster Social Capital and Civic Engagement after Camp.” This paper explores the connections between camp programming and its potential to foster social capital and civic engagement in campers’ home communities. The final paper in this issue by Barry Garst, Sarah Baughman, Anja Whittington, and Ryan Gagnon is titled “Influences of Resident Camp Experiences on Career Choice: A Case Study of Female Alumnae.” This paper explores the long-term impacts of camp experiences on the future career paths of women. The quality of the aforementioned papers is directly due to the commitment and rigor of both the authors and the anonymous reviewers of the papers featured within this issue. We are actively exploring ways to increase the exposure of ROE. We ask that all of those associated with the Coalition for Education in the Outdoors continue to get the word out about ROE to potential authors and reviewers, especially to those who have not submitted a paper or served as reviewers in the past. In closing, we are grateful for the opportunity to sustain and hopefully expand...

Residential Environmental Education Center Program Evaluation: An Ongoing Challenge

Residential environmental education centers (REECs) have been criticized for their lack of quality program evaluation. However, the last national study done on the practices of REECs was Chenery and Hammerman's (1985) research. This article presents the results of a national survey of directors of REECs (n = 114) that gives insight into the current practices and needs of their centers. While some directors are satisfied with their current evaluation practices, others recognize that their centers need improvement in this area. Analysis of survey results provides insight into the needs of REEC directors as program evaluations are developed for REECs.

Environmental Education Centers and Local Communities: A Case Study

The International Community has designated the “Sustainable Development” as a central issue for the future of humanity. Unesco has named the decade 2005-2014 as the decade for the “Education for the Sustainable Development”. It has also engaged with the promotion of this project in order to “…integrate the values and practices of sustainable development to all the forms of education”. The Environmental Education Centres (EEC) were created during the past twenty years and they emerged from the growing interest in the issue of Environmental Education. Of course, the places where EEC are created are places of rich natural resources. The institution of EEC is highly connected to the environmental movement and it is internationally considered one of the most important factors of extra curriculum education. The Environmental Education Centres are encouraged to cooperate with the citizens in decision-making [2]. They are also encouraged to connect with the lifelong learning, the traditional learning, the local administration and the production units in the appropriate places and with the appropriate members, in order to become an effective structure of Education for Sustainable Development [6]. They can influence the local communities and create an environmental friendly situation. In 2013, at the place Meliti in the prefecture of Florina, an empirical research was carried out in order to explore the role of an Environmental Center in distant areas. The research shows that the operation of Environmental Education Centres influences the students and the local communities, especially when the centre operates in peripheral and disadvantaged areas. The EEC Melitis has a positive impact on the local community. It brings profit to local community, to local businesses (coffee shops, restaurants, ect.), it empowers the local pride, it makes children familiar with the natural and economic identity of their area and with their parents’ professions. Most importantly, the children are being environmentally informed and they can evolve into future protectors of sustainability.

Public Participation in Environmental Education Centers

This paper presents participation of faculties and Heads of Department (HODs) in environmental education. For this purpose 60 HODs/faculties from polytechnic colleges of Tamilnadu, India and 100 HODs/ faculties from Associate Degree Level Technical Institutions in Iran from civil engineering branch were selected. Several hypotheses were formulated to achieve certain objectives of the study. The results revealed that there are significances between Iranian and Indian HODs/faculty on arrangement of industrial visits/field trips for students; laboratory resources for practical works and also teaching environmental subjects. The results also show a good agreement on students undertaking project work on environmental topics, teaching prevention of pollution and protection of environment in theory classes and evaluation of environmental related programs.

Health impact assessment of chrome-based leather tanning: short report of an ongoing case study of Pakistan.

This document reports on an on-going case study of the health impact of chrome-bases leather tanning industry on workers in Kasur Pakistan. Untreated discharges containing high concentrations of chromium and sulfides from tanning factories have turned a large stretch of fertile agricultural land into lakes of stagnant wastewater. An action research was conducted by the Participatory Development Resource Center (PDRC) Sakono-lab Tokyo Institute of Technology that started with a workshop in March 2000. The research aimed to motivate local government agencies for environmental protection and civil society to take action. PDRC conducted a survey for identification of diseases and death causes in Kasur as a follow-up to the recommendations formulated by the workshop. Seminars and training workshops are being organized by the Pakistan Society of Geographic Information Systems to strengthen the technical capabilities of town planners and health staffs on environment and health protection. Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in Pakistan are collaborating to set up Non Formal Environmental Education Centers in all educational institutions and offices of NGOs. Much more needs to be done such as research for the assessment of economic losses and systematic collection of data to provide links between presence of chemicals and occurrence of diseases.

A human ecological analysis of organizational response to changes in public education policy

This article describes research on the response of environmental education centers, such as nature centers, zoos, and museums to recent changes in public education policy in Texas. These changes had the potential to reduce public school field trips to off-campus educational facilities. Five hypotheses are derived from human ecological theory that focus on organizational function, hierarchical integration, resource competition, and organizational capacity as determinants of response to the policy changes. A probit analysis indicated that off-campus environmental education centers were more likely to adapt to the changes if their “key” function was education, if they had a pattern of relatively extensive interaction with other local units, and if they were characterized by higher levels of “excess capacity.”

Strategy for a National Network for Environmental Education

Abstract The Alliance for Environmental Education, organized in 1972, provides a forum for governmental and private organizations to further the development and coordination of effective environmental education programs through conferences, publications, and networking. The Alliance proposes to establish a national network of centers for environmental education (NNEE). A major initiative for the next decade, NNEE is a non-advocacy effort co-developed and co-founded by the Alliance with local business, industry, state and local education and resource agencies and host universities. Centers will interact through the network and work with existing regional and local environmental education centers and similar national efforts. The purpose of this paper is to provide an introduction to this effort, describe its components, and explain how the NNEE strategy evolved.

Regional Environmental Education Centers

Regional Environmental Education Centers