Assessing the Landscape: Mapping Current Progress and Uncovering Pathways for Growth

What is currently happening in my district and where are there opportunities for growth?

No matter how much or how little you know about what your school district is already doing related to environmental literacy, conducting an inventory with multiple stakeholders can be a helpful way of gathering information, ground truthing your knowledge, and discovering new opportunities for environmental education. A great place to start is to review your district's response to the Environmental Literacy Indicator Tool (ELIT) Survey. This is administered by the Education Workgroup of the Chesapeake Bay Program on an every-other-year basis to all school districts in the Mid-Atlantic region to monitor the status of environmental literacy efforts at a district level.

There are many ways to conduct an inventory from individual conversations to surveys to focus groups but there are some things to keep in mind regardless of your chosen method.

Who

• Involve stakeholders from a variety of levels within the system and those who have different perspectives and interests. Engaging multiple stakeholders can provide a more balanced and nuanced picture of what is and could be happening in your school district.

• Some individuals, like those in charge of instruction and curriculum, or teachers from multiple grades and disciplines, are integral to assessing what environmental literacy programming is occurring and where there are opportunities for more.

• Nonformal and community education partners who may support schoolyard-based and offsite-based field experiences can provide a unique external perspective and can share about their resources, programs (e.g., in-class lesson, outdoor field experiences, professional development), and outdoor learning locations to help you plan new opportunities.

• Principals and facilities managers often have important information about rules and restrictions around using different areas of the schoolyard for outdoor learning.

• Involving the wider community, including students and their families, can uncover where there are additional opportunities to build on.

What

• The questions used in the assessment phase should be customized to each stakeholder group. For example, there may be a few questions that are applicable to all stakeholders, while others are more specific and can only be answered by a particular group of people.

• Be clear about the kinds of programs and initiatives that fall within environmental literacy by including examples that can spark your stakeholders minds without influencing the results too much.

• One of the most important parts of the environmental literacy plan is articulating where things like MWEEs and outdoor experiences are occurring over a student’s academic career. Include questions that uncover the extent (e.g., How often and where do students learn outside? Do students take part in environmental action?) to which these experiences are occurring for all students in a grade.

• Ask about schoolyards to uncover opportunities for outdoor learning. Is there a current or inactive garden? Does the school neighbor or contain a stream, forest or other natural habitat? Are there structures to support outdoor learning like tables and shade?

• There may be spaces in the curriculum that are poised to integrate environmental education. Help stakeholders familiar with the curriculum brainstorm opportunities by considering where learning could be localized, where community partner expertise could enrich learning, or where the local environment could be the subject matter.

• Include open-ended questions that provide stakeholders the opportunity to describe additional areas of opportunity for environmental literacy activities or programs or where capacity is needed in order to enhance an element (e.g., professional development, supplies, partnership).

How

Just as you customize questions, consider adjusting the format of how you learn about environmental literacy depending on your stakeholders. This could look like focus groups, interviews, surveys, other methods, or a combination of these.

Examples of Assessment Resources