Thinking Ecologically

Thinking Ecologically
Author: Marian Chertow
Publisher: Yale University Press
Total Pages: 292
Release: 1997-01-01
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 9780300073034

Twenty-five years ago, the Cuyahoga River in Ohio was so contaminated that it caught fire, air pollution in some cities was thick enough to taste, and environmental laws focused on the obvious enemy: large American factories with belching smokestacks and pipes gushing wastes. Federal legislation has succeeded in providing cleaner air and water, but we now confront a different set of environmental problems--less visible and more subtle. This important book offers thought-provoking ideas on how America can respond to changing public health and ecological risks and create sound environmental policy for the future. The innovative thinkers of the Next Generation Project of the Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy--experts from business, government, nongovernmental organizations, and academia--propose reforms that balance environmental efforts with other public needs and issues. They call for new foundations for environmental law and policy, adoption of a more diverse set of policy tools and strategies (economic incentives, ecolabels), and new connections between critical sectors (agriculture, energy, transportation, service providers) and environmental policy. Future progress must involve not only officials from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and state environmental protection departments, say the authors, but also decision-makers as diverse as mayors, farmers, energy company executives, and delivery route planners. To be effective, next-generation policy-making will view environmental challenges comprehensively, connect academic theory with practical policy, and bridge the gaps that have caused recent policy debates to break down in rancor. This book begins the process of accomplishing these challenging goals.

Ecology in Education

Ecology in Education
Author: Monica Hale
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 212
Release: 1995-09-28
Genre: Nature
ISBN: 9780521556699

Ecological and environmental education in schools and institutes of further and higher education has gained increasing importance in recent years, both as an area of study in its own right, and as a component of other disciplines. There is now a requirement in many countries to include the environment in both formal and informal curricula. This volume presents a long overdue account of the status, progress and underlying concepts of ecological education. It explores areas of recent development and debate in ecological and environmental education, describes the evolution and development of environmental education in different countries and examines the importance and provision for fieldwork. Case studies illustrate how ecological studies are undertaken in several culturally different settings. This book will interest teachers and research workers in ecology, environmental science and education.

Remaking College

Remaking College
Author: Mitchell Stevens
Publisher: Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 336
Release: 2015-01-07
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0804793557

Between 1945 and 1990 the United States built the largest and most productive higher education system in world history. Over the last two decades, however, dramatic budget cuts to public academic services and skyrocketing tuition have made college completion more difficult for many. Nevertheless, the democratic promise of education and the global competition for educated workers mean ever growing demand. Remaking College considers this changing context, arguing that a growing accountability revolution, the push for greater efficiency and productivity, and the explosion of online learning are changing the character of higher education. Writing from a range of disciplines and professional backgrounds, the contributors each bring a unique perspective to the fate and future of U.S. higher education. By directing their focus to schools doing the lion's share of undergraduate instruction—community colleges, comprehensive public universities, and for-profit institutions—they imagine a future unencumbered by dominant notions of "traditional" students, linear models of achievement, and college as a four-year residential experience. The result is a collection rich with new tools for helping people make more informed decisions about college—for themselves, for their children, and for American society as a whole.

International Perspectives on the Theory and Practice of Environmental Education: A Reader

International Perspectives on the Theory and Practice of Environmental Education: A Reader
Author: Giuliano Reis
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 247
Release: 2017-11-15
Genre: Science
ISBN: 3319677322

The present book shares critical perspectives on the conceptualization, implementation, discourses, policies, and alternative practices of environmental education (EE) for diverse and unique groups of learners in a variety of international educational settings. Each contribution offers insights on the authors’ own processes of re-imagining an education in/about/for the environment that are realized through their teaching, research and other ways of “doing” EE. Overall, environmental education has been aimed at giving people a wider appreciation of the diversity of cultural and environmental systems around them as well as the urge to overcome existing problems. In this context, universities, schools, and community-based organizations struggle to promote sustainable environmental education practices geared toward the development of ecologically literate citizens in light of surmountable challenges of hyperconsumerism, environmental depletion and socioeconomic inequality. The extent that individuals within educational systems are expected to effectively respond to—as well as benefit from—a “greener” and more just world becomes paramount with the vision and analysis of different successes and challenges embodied by EE efforts worldwide. This book fosters conversations amongst researchers, teacher educators, schoolteachers, and community leaders in order to promote new international collaborations around current and potential forms of environmental education. This book reflects many successful international projects and perspectives on the theory and praxis of environmental education. An eclectic mix of international scholars challenge environmental educators to engage issues of reconciliation of correspondences and difference across regions. In their own ways, authors stimulate critical conversations that seem pivotal for necessary re-imaginings of research and pedagogy across the grain of cultural and ecological realities, systematic barriers and reconceptualizations of environmental education. The book is most encouraging in that it works to expand the creative commons for progress in teaching, researching and doing environmental education in desperate times. — Paul Hart, Professor of Science and Environmental Education at the University of Regina (Canada), Melanson Award for outstanding contributions to environmental and outdoor education (Saskatchewan Outdoor and Environmental Education Association) and North American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE)’s Jeske Award for Leadership and Service to the Field of EE and Outstanding Contributions to Research in EE. In an attempt to overcome simplistic and fragmented views of doing Environmental Education in both formal and informal settings, the collected authors from several countries/continents present a wealth of cultural, social, political, artistic, pedagogical, and ethical perspectives that enrich our vision on the theoretical and practical foundations of the field. A remarkable book that I suggest all environmental educators, teacher educators, policy and curricular writers read and present to their students in order to foster dialogue around innovative ways of experiencing an education about/in/for the environment. — Rute Monteiro, Professor of Science Education, Universidade do Algarve/ University of Algarve (Portugal).

The Failure of Environmental Education (And How We Can Fix It)

The Failure of Environmental Education (And How We Can Fix It)
Author: Charles Saylan
Publisher: Univ of California Press
Total Pages: 254
Release: 2011-05-25
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0520265386

“The hope for the future depends on teaching current and future students the analytical and critical thinking skills for dealing with the most critical problems. My own hope is for this book to be read by everyone, even those outside the field of environmental education. Read this book, read it again, share it widely, and do something - anything - to help our needy and wounded planet."-Marc Bekoff, author of The Animal Manifesto: Six Reasons For Expanding Our Compassion Footprint "Saylan and Blumstein provide a compelling vision of what can be, and what should be, if we have the courage to open our eyes and the boldness to act.”-Peter Saundry, Ph.D., Executive Director of the National Council for Science and the Environment “A clarion call to incorporate environmental education in all grades K-12, across all academic disciplines, in order to produce future generations of environmental stewards."-Mark Gold, President, Heal The Bay "We need a sea change in the educational system. After all, if we can teach schoolchildren that vandalism is wrong, why can we not teach them that environmental destruction is wrong? This book is a haunting call to action. A beautifully written manifesto that gets it right."-Ron Swaisgood, Director of Applied Animal Ecology, Institute for Conservation Research, San Diego Zoo Global “The greatest threat to the future of all species on the planet is the huge gap between what is understood about global climate change by the scientific community and what is known about climate change by the people who need to know -- the public. The sound prescriptions in this book need to be read now. We are running out of time.”-Dr. James Hansen, world-renowned climatologist and author of Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity “Environmental education is a disaster and educating the public on environmental issues is the greatest challenge facing humanity today. This book will help us understand why we are headed toward the collapse of civilization, and more important, how to fix it. Packed with sound science, useful information, and brilliant ideas, it is a book we must read, and give, to our local school boards and principals nationwide. Our children will thank us."-Paul R. Ehrlich, author of The Population Bomb and Humanity on a Tightrope

Race, Equity, and Education

Race, Equity, and Education
Author: Pedro Noguera
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 300
Release: 2015-11-14
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 3319237721

This powerful and timely analysis takes stock of race and education sixty years after the historic Brown vs. Board of Education decision. This volume examines education as one of the most visible markers for racial disparities in the US as well as one of its most visible frontiers for racial justice. Featuring original research, educators’ insights, and perspectives from communities of color, it documents the complex impact of social/educational policy on social progress. Chapters on charter schools, curriculum content, performance measurement, and disproportionalities in special education referrals shed light on entrenched inequities that must be confronted. The book also makes it clear that leveling the playing field calls for not only better schools, but also addressing pervasive social problems such as poverty and housing segregation. Included in the coverage: School Policy is Housing Policy: Deconcentrating Disadvantage to Address the Achievement Gap. Charter Schooling, Race Politics, and an Appeal to History. The Data Quality Movement for the Asian American and Pacific Islander community: an unresolved civil rights issue. Critical Ethnic Studies in High School Classrooms: Academic Achievement via Social Action. Mexican American Educational Stagnation: The Role of Generational Status, Parental Narratives and Educator Mes sages. p/pp Pinpointing crucial issues and opportunities for solutions, Race, Equity, and Education has immediate salience for educators and researchers studying the intersection of race and education.

The Ecology of the School

The Ecology of the School
Author: John Eggleston
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 138
Release: 2012
Genre: Education
ISBN: 0415675413

Within a single educational system - that of England and Wales - the nature of schooling available to a child can be dramatically different. Even between residential areas the differences in educational climate can be striking. Apart from differences in the organization of schools and the availability of buildings, teachers and resources, there are also significant ideological variations between local education authorities. This book considers the evidence of such differences, some of the environmental factors (political, social and economic) that may account for their distribution, and the consequences that appear to spring from them.

The Ecology of Human Development

The Ecology of Human Development
Author: Urie BRONFENBRENNER
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 349
Release: 2009-06-30
Genre: Psychology
ISBN: 0674028848

Here is a book that challenges the very basis of the way psychologists have studied child development. According to Urie Bronfenbrenner, one of the world's foremost developmental psychologists, laboratory studies of the child's behavior sacrifice too much in order to gain experimental control and analytic rigor. Laboratory observations, he argues, too often lead to "the science of the strange behavior of children in strange situations with strange adults for the briefest possible periods of time." To understand the way children actually develop, Bronfenbrenner believes that it will be necessary to observe their behavior in natural settings, while they are interacting with familiar adults over prolonged periods of time. This book offers an important blueprint for constructing such a new and ecologically valid psychology of development. The blueprint includes a complete conceptual framework for analysing the layers of the environment that have a formative influence on the child. This framework is applied to a variety of settings in which children commonly develop, ranging from the pediatric ward to daycare, school, and various family configurations. The result is a rich set of hypotheses about the developmental consequences of various types of environments. Where current research bears on these hypotheses, Bronfenbrenner marshals the data to show how an ecological theory can be tested. Where no relevant data exist, he suggests new and interesting ecological experiments that might be undertaken to resolve current unknowns. Bronfenbrenner's groundbreaking program for reform in developmental psychology is certain to be controversial. His argument flies in the face of standard psychological procedures and challenges psychology to become more relevant to the ways in which children actually develop. It is a challenge psychology can ill-afford to ignore.

Systems Design of Education

Systems Design of Education
Author: Bela H. Banathy
Publisher: Educational Technology
Total Pages: 272
Release: 1991
Genre: Education
ISBN: 9780877782292

Discusses the crisis in education currently and offers a systems approach to developing a new design and perception for education and the learning process. Presents an intellectual technology of systems design to be used by teachers and educational leaders and an agenda for preservice and inservice professional development.