By Richard Knab, Founder and Executive Director of EcoEducate
What if education wasn’t just about textbooks, computers, or classroom learning? What if it were rooted in the places students call home, drawing upon real-world environmental, social, and economic challenges these communities encounter daily? What if learning was about engaging with the world around us, not just reading or hearing about it? What if this approach fostered a desire among students to act and build more sustainable futures? This is the kind of education we promote at EcoEducate.
My family and oldest friends continue to kid me when they hear my passion about education. I was the most creative of my siblings when it came time for coming up with an excuse to stay home from school or for not handing in my homework. It wasn’t until college that I developed a love for learning. And it was several years later in Honduras, as a parent and Board member of a small school looking to improve, that I came to understand the power of high-quality, evidence-based PreK-12 education, especially when it involves experiential learning and a connection to place.
So, what will this organization, EcoEducate, do?
Our amazing team of educators, advisors, local partners, and investors will build on experiences and lessons we have learned in the Galapagos Islands and others parts of the world, to achieve sustained, system-wide change in education communities in ecologically valuable and fragile islands and coastal regions in Latin America.
We will do this by building local capacity to deliver and perpetuate high-quality, research-backed professional development for teachers that prepares educators to foster learning connected to the real-life need and opportunities in the communities where we work.
This kind of education is proven to improve student learning of core subjects and to develop higher-order thinking skills: critical thinking, problem-solving, metacognition (read more about this in Miriam Chacón’s excellent post!), creative thinking, applying knowledge to new situations, and distinguishing fact from opinion. It also has been shown to develop student’s understanding and appreciation of the places they live and to become actively involved in building more sustainable futures.
Can you imagine what the world might look like today if this kind of education were the norm?
Our work is based on the following beliefs:
· Teachers are the most significant factor in improving student achievement.
· Achieving improvements in teaching practices takes time and requires patience from parents, ministries and funders.
· Place-based, project-based, experiential, and contextualized learning are powerful approaches, but require teachers to have a strong foundation of basic teaching skills.
· Monitoring and evaluation are essential to provide teachers and school leaders data needed for decision-making and to document changes in teacher practices, student outcomes, and program impact.
· It is essential to build the capacity of local education communities to ensure continuity of high-quality professional development and to mobilize the financial and technical resources needed to do so.
On an operational level, our team will work tirelessly, transparently, collaboratively, and efficiently, with a commitment to ongoing learning. We will think big and boldly, but responsibly and without overlooking isolated and underserved educational communities.
Our Board, staff, and advisors share deep personal and professional respect for one another built over a decade of friendship and collaboration. We look forward to maintaining a culture based on respect, transparency, and learning from mistakes, as EcoEducate matures, and new collaborators become involved in our work.
I am so grateful for the friends, mentors, outstanding educators and funders who have made EcoEducate possible. We will do our best to deserve your continued trust.
We’d love to hear from anyone interested in exchanging ideas or learning more about or supporting our work. Please feel free to contact me at [email protected].
With my very best wishes,
