Puget Sound Sunrise (Photo: Kathryn Keve)
Bringing the community to the classroom and classroom to the community...
The Sustainable Schools and Community Initiative
The Global Source Sustainable Schools and Community Initiative consists of place-based professional development programs for K-12 teachers, bringing together resources from our bio-region on food, farming, forestry, health, nutrition, habitat, conservation, history, and civics. We include on-site experiences for teachers to bring back to their classrooms, locations for future field trips, and ideas on how to conserve and benefit from the local ecology. Our programs include Food, Farming, Culture and Education, and Salmon Conservation, and take place at community settings such as Day Road Farms, Stillwaters Environmental Center, and the Kitsap Mountaineers’ Cabin at Chico Creek Center and at schools.
The Sustainable Schools Project
How can a school curriculum inform and affect a school’s ecological footprint?
In collaboration with Jonathan Scherch and Ed Mikel from Antioch University Seattle, we are launching this project to
help teachers and students transform their schools into sustainable living and learning centers that conserve energy and
accommodate climate transitions with competence and confidence.
This summer's program is a dedicated planning retreat with Beidablik School in the North Kitsap School District.
Please let us know if you'd be interested in learning more, or would like to attend an introductory workshop, or be on our list of schools that are ready to plan and implement school-wide transformation that includes staff and students, classroom practices and curricular integration, school operations and management of resources.
Food, Farming, Culture and Education
What are the possibilities for teaching and learning about food and farming in our classrooms and
communities? We work with the Trust for
Working Landscape along with Day Road Farms and Bainbridge Vineyards as our education center and demonstration site.
This program is an opportunity for educators, farmers,
community leaders and other stakeholders to engage in issues of food and farming, such as sources, costs, and nutrition.
Salmon, Education and Conservation
Salmon conservation is a vital issue to the Northwest Pacific Rim bio-region and economy.
In partnership with the Chico Creek Watershed Advisory Committee, we visit the most productive salmon conservation
system on the Kitsap Peninsula. Explore how to protect local waterways with field trips and data collection that can be
brought to classroom science curricula.
Statutory Authority for Environmental and Sustainability Education
In 1990, the State Board of Education created a rule defining environmental education as part of Basic Education and mandating its instruction in public school at all grade levels in all subject matters.
"WAC 180-50-115 Mandatory areas of study in the common school.
Subsection (6) Pursuant to RCW 28A.230.020 instruction about conservation, natural resources, and the environment shall be provided at all grade levels in an interdisciplinary manner through science, the social studies, the humanities, and other appropriate areas with an emphasis on solving the problems of human adaptation to the environment."
