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The Funders^ Forum on Environment and Education (F2E2) is an informal network of grantmakers interested in environment and place-based approaches to education that contribute to positive student outcomes, academic achievement, personal development as well as environmental literacy, at the K-12 and post-secondary levels. The underlying assumption is that young people, duly educated and inspired, will become active participants in the life of their communities, working to solve social and environmental problems. F2E2^s principal activities are directed at increasing funders^ awareness and knowledge of developments and opportunities in the environmental education field. We are a project of The Tides Center (see below).
We provide information and program development assistance in several focus areas:
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Healthy, High Performance Schools: We encourage funders, educators and facilities planners to use sustainable and environmentally healthy practices in building and renovating schools. A symposium held in March 2003 at the Johnson Foundation^s Wingspread conference center in Racine, WI, brought together professionals from the fields of education, school construction, community engagement, children^s environmental health, architecture, and environment, to talk about how schools can be made more healthy, high performing, community-centered, and educationally appropriate.
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Environmental Education and Literacy: The Funders^ Forum joins other advocacy groups in encouraging the integration of Enviromental Education into mainstream education. The systems and process orientation implied by environmental studies is, we believe, key to all learning and to creating future leaders who know how to think about complex problems.
- Place-Based Education in K-12 Schools: We encourage funders and educators to develop programs that use their immediate environments as the context for learning. We report on place-based practices that provide comprehensive improvement in academic achievement, environmental literacy and civic participation.
- Environmental Science Standards: Just as national standards have been set for curriculum in mathematics and reading, the federal government has created standards in science. Out of the belief that astute policy thinkers are made, not born, F2E2 is working with constituents within the environmental field to make certain that when the individul states adopt their own science standards, they include curriculum and assessment requirements that will produce the kind of environmental systems thinkers the coming decades will require.
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Sustainability Programs in Higher Education: We encourage universities and colleges, and the donors who support them, to provide leadership toward a more sustainable society through their course offerings, facilities, business decisions, and community relations.
At F2E2, we also work to expand environmental advocacy efforts by encouraging organizations across the country to develop the policy, media and other skills needed to advocate effectively for environmental education in their communities.
About the Tides Center:
The Tides Center strengthens the roots of the social change movement by partnering quality management services with creative programmatic endeavors. It provides a fiscal home and infrastructure support to charitable initiatives that are not incorporated as nonprofit organizations. For more than 20 years, The Tides Center has been helping committed individuals concentrate their time and energy on their programs and goals. For more information, visit www.tidescenter.org.
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Click below
for past editions of the Funders^ Forum Newletter
Place-Based Education
(Sept. ^01)
Environmental Education
(April ^02)
High Performance Schools
(Sept. ^02)
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