As we noted earlier in the week, our President, Bill Scott, is attending the NAAEE conference in San Diego. Here’s a comment from him on experiencing the event …
The first thing to note is that there are around 1200 people here representing all aspects of environmental education in North America: teachers, NGO staff, university academics, researchers, administrators and people from business.
As a consequence of this rich mix, there is an energy and vitality about the event which is inspiring. Coming here illustrates the breadth of activity across the 50 states.
The conference is the usual mix of presentations, workshops, symposia, field trips, visits, round tables, keynote addresses, and there are several hundreds of these taking place, many of course at the same time. This morning, for example, I’m faced with a choice amongst:
– an evaluation clinic – equity through citizen science – from research to implementation – outdoor education through mobile gaming – cultivating community resilience – environmental literacy plans – one minute climate change films – is climate change changing EE? – connecting urban youth with nature experiences – gear libraries and kids outdoors – teaching environmental sustainability – nature-rich outdoor classrooms – partners for polar bears – saying no to field trips may be good for conservation – how community engagement drives conservation action – addressing barriers and engaging urban audiences – environmental literacy of UG students in China – bridging university researching science education – embracing climate change skeptics – interpreting big ideas with an audience –And this, mark you, is at 0830. At 0930 there’s another set to choose from. At 1030, another. And so on through the day. If you need a rest from all this discussion, you can visit the huge exhibition hall to see what publishers and others are up to – a lot, needless to say – or you can just talk to other people over endless (though not very good) coffee. Or you can listen to keynote addresses; today’s is by Andy Goodman on Change the Story: Change the world. Goodman presents on presenting, so I’m going along to hear how it should be done.
You can see the conference programme here. I first came in 1998, and I have long thought that every UK environmental educator should come here at least once. Next year it’s in Wisconsin from 18 to 22 October; time to book your ticket, …