Western societies will, in the end, be subservient to the land and what it can provide and teach. . .we will never know ourselves until we know where we are on this land. ~Paul Hawken I was travelling, was halfway across the country when the Tubbs fire started in Northern California. The most destructive wildfire in […]
When Mustafa Ali, the decades-long advisor for the Environmental Protection Agency who elevated social justice and industry accountability into the government’s environmental protection agenda, was asked why oversight is needed to ensure the protection and health of lands inhabited by communities of color, Ali did not mince words. “That’s what happens when you are disconnected […]
It’s a sunny May morning in the Imperial Valley; by 8:00am it’s already 90° and climbing. I arrived the afternoon before and decided to avoid the interstate by taking the 78, a winding two-lane road that at times looks like what I imagine the surface of the moon would. Extending south from the Salton Sea […]
“The students cleared a local pond that frequently gets clogged with natural or human-made pollution. On their return visit, they saw that a huge log had been thrown into the pond–but when they went to remove it, they found a thriving ecosystem of snails reclaiming the wood. So the students made the independent decision to […]
Last week Ten Strands and the San Mateo County Office of Education—STEM Center hosted the second iteration of the San Mateo Environmental Learning Collaborative (SM ELC), a professional learning workshop for San Mateo county teachers. The SM ELC brought together area nonformal environmental education partners, curriculum experts from the State Education and Environment Roundtable (SEER), teacher trainers from CalRecycle’s Office of Education […]
Last week I attended ChangeScale’s 2nd Annual Environmental Literacy Congress. Beyond just learning from the presentations, I had a true ‘aha’ moment when I looked around at all the different organizations being represented and realized that environmental literacy is not a sidelined goal or initiative. We are at the beginning of a growing movement that […]
Today my team at Ten Strands and I were pondering the bubble we live in here in the Bay Area. In general, everyone we talk to and work with seems to understand that climate change is a pressing issue that impacts us now and will impact future generations even more severely. It got me wondering […]
literate (adj.) “educated, instructed,” early 15c., from Latin literatus/litteratus “educated, learned,” literally “one who knows the letters,” formed in imitation of Greek grammatikos from Latin littera/litera “letter” Literacy, as traditionally defined, describes the ability to use written language actively and passively; to read, write, spell, listen, and speak with some degree of proficiency. However, as we move further into the 21st century […]