On October 14-16, 2019, a group of Earth educators participated in the Earth Education for Sustainable Societies Workshop held in Northfield, MN. At the workshop, we discussed ideas designed to strengthen Earth education and divided into subgroups based on shared interests. One subgroup focused on the idea of place-based education and several of us pursued the idea of creating a series of workshops to facilitate the development and distribution of place-based educational activities focused on the Earth and sustainability.

As currently envisioned, the project will engage a core group of educators and content experts to identify a broadly applicable set of place-based education techniques useful for teaching Earth science concepts that lead to sustainable practices. The core group will then develop and lead a series of workshops to share those techniques. The workshops will be designed to help educators develop place-based learning activities which they can use in their communities and share with their peers. Though the context is rooted in Earth science, we hope to engage participants across disciplines and develop place-based educational activities that can be used in a wide range of educational, geographic, and cultural settings.

We have several models (such as the SAGE 2YC Change Agents project and NAGT Traveling Workshops) on which the project structure will be based. As we develop the project, we seek input with respect to content and techniques to share as well as educators, researchers, and others interested in participating in the core group or as workshop participants.