Standing beside poster boards, systems maps, and student-designed presentations, freshmen in the San Ramon Valley Unified School District (SRVUSD) shared their views on how global issues such as climate change, mental health, biodiversity loss, and social and political polarization connect...
Anne Armstrong didn’t think of herself as a climate champion. She teaches at ALBA Community Day School in San Diego, a small site serving students navigating expulsion, suspension, and deep generational trauma. With water growing scarcer across California, she built...
Today, I’m pleased to introduce an exciting climate education capacity-building opportunity. Since AB 285’s passage in 2023, California’s public schools and districts are required to provide students in grades 1-12 with annual educational opportunities on climate change causes, effects, solutions,...
Before working at Ten Strands, I worked for Key Curriculum Press, a publisher that focused on inquiry-based mathematics, including the simple idea that students should be supported in learning to think their way through problems, not in memorizing their way...
There’s a moment I’ve watched hundreds of times, and it still stops me every time. A kid stands at the edge of the water with a board that’s bigger than they are. Their shoulders are up around their ears. You...
Ask any Angeleno about the Inland Empire, or “the IE,” and you’ll get a dozen different answers. To the uninitiated, the Inland Empire is the name given to Riverside and San Bernardino Counties, two sprawling counties sitting on Tongva, Cahuilla,...
This article was developed for the CAELI Green Ribbon Initiative spring 2026 Green Hills Elementary School, part of the Millbrae Elementary School District in San Mateo County, is building a school culture where environmental stewardship, student leadership, and community engagement...
I’m a naturally competitive person. Whether it’s sports, business, or anything else, nothing brings out my competitive streak like an uneven playing field. Early in my education career, I worked with two groups: the students in my school day classes...
There’s a well-respected model in child development called the ecological systems theory (Bronfenbrenner 1979). It posits that child development is best understood in the context of the entire ecosystem in which children grow up and the forces that shape it....
(This article is the fourth in a series featuring the formation and progress of the coalition carrying out the California Campaign for Outdoor Learning. It is also the first in a new series exploring the connection between outdoor learning and...
