Environmental Education

Intro    1: What is EE    2: Why is EE Important?    3: Is EE Under Attack?    4: What Can You Do to Help?    5:  Resources and Bibliography

Humans are constantly asked to make decisions that may directly or indirectly affect the environment. The education we receive growing up plays a huge role in developing competent citizens. To ensure citizens are making intelligent and responsible decisions concerning any issue, it is vital that our educational system equips individuals with the relevant knowledge and skills. Environmental education is one such means that will assist students in this process. The goal of environmental education is not to produce "environmental activists", but instead "¹ is aimed at producing a citizenry that is knowledgeable concerning the biophysical environment and its associated problems, aware of how to help solve these problems, and motivated to work toward their solution" (Stapp et al. 1969). In his book Earth in Mind, David Orr wrote, "Education is not widely regarded as a problem, although the lack of it is. The conventional wisdom holds that all education is good, and the more of it one has, the better¹ The truth is that without significant precautions, education can equip people merely to be more effective vandals of the earth" (5). He finds that despite the rapid decline in global ecosystem health, we continue to educate as if there were no ecological crisis, which essentially perpetuates this state of planetary emergency. Orr believes, "¹ that educators must become students of the ecologically proficient mind and of the things that must be done to foster such minds. In time this will mean nothing less than the redesign of education itself" (3).