This is the final post of a three article series that provides Jamie’s answers to several questions I recently posed to her regarding sustainability education.

The Cloud Institute offers several services, including long-term consulting, curriculum design and development, and Education for Sustainability workshops. Which offering is the most popular and which have you seen result in the most significant change for clients?

The most whole system work we do is with school districts and their communities learning together for a sustainable future.  We call those our Sites Learn initiatives. Examples include the nine sites around the country that are members of the Society for Organizational Learning (SoL) Education Partnership that Peter Senge and I created with a team of colleagues, and also our New Jersey Learns program which is funded by The Geraldine R. Dodge Foundation and is made up of a growing number of sites around New Jersey that participate in Sustainable Jersey.

The next level on the continuum is our Districts Learn work. We work with individual districts and consortia of districts to Educate for Sustainability. The best example of that is our work with seventeen districts through the Putnam Northern Westchester BOCES on a massive and multifaceted EfS initiative that is grounded in a core set of web-based exemplary units of study across all grade levels and disciplines (www.pnwboces.org/efs). Next, we work with individual schools (Schools Learn) from PS 208 in Harlem to the Denver Green School, and from Trevor Day School in NYC to Marin Country Day School in Corte Madera, California, to name a few.

Having said all of that, indeed a big part of the work we do involves professional development and coaching of teachers, leadership development and organizational learning consulting and planning with administrators, and work with educators to embed EfS into the core curriculum. Most K-12 schools are new to EfS. A small minority have been working on it since the early 1990s.

We usually begin a relationship with a school or district by providing an introduction to sustainability and education for sustainability in order to achieve three outcomes: 1) A shared understanding among the stakeholders of sustainability and EfS; 2) A personal rationale for educating for sustainability, and; 3) Participants will become inspired and hopeful about contributing to sustainability through education. All the educators that I have ever met without exception want what is good for kids. It is a deep and fundamental aspiration to contribute to the health and well-being of our children and of future generations. It is a lot of work—especially in the beginning—but it is worth it.  Our children are worth it.

What is the most important actionable item you would like readers to take away?

Schools and communities must learn together for a sustainable future.   Demand a  whole systems approach to Education for Sustainability in your schools and community.

EfS is designed to solve more than one problem at a time and to minimize the creation of new problems.  We know that when schools employ this approach over time in partnership with their communities, and implement  EfS in the day to day actions of school community members and explicit instruction,  EfS improves student achievement, increases civic engagement, increases young people’s sense of efficacy,  and improves children’s health and other sustainable community indicators including air quality, waste reduction and energy conservation.  Without children and young people engaged in, and contributing to community initiatives, sustainable communities cannot exist.

Contribute to sustainability through collaborative initiatives that are developed through school and community partnerships.  Education for sustainability is a whole systems approach to education.  Lasting transformation in education requires innovation at the curricular, institutional, and community levels.  By linking schools and communities, kids and adults are thinking differently, learning and working together—all for the future we want.

 A healthy and sustainable future is possible.  Call us.  We will help you educate for it.

This article is cross-posted on Environmental Leader.

Over the past decade, hotel companies have implemented programs to reduce the waste generated and the energy used in their daily operations. Many have been successful in saving both resources and money as well as attracting environmentally conscious guests; however, the industry as a whole has yet to make sustainability an integral part of its strategic plans. The Two Tomorrow’s sustainability agency’s latest survey, the Tomorrow’s Value Rating (TVR) from 2009, indicates that the world’s ten largest hotel companies “are only just beginning to address the wide range of social and environmental challenges facing the sector.” Climate Counts, which scores corporations on the climate impact of their business, found similar results when researching six major hotel firms. “The world’s largest hotel chains may be seeking practical ways to address a range of broad environmental impacts in their operations . . . however, few appear to be aligning such actions as part of a larger and more comprehensive carbon management strategy. An average sector score of 19 out of a possible 100 suggests the sector has much work ahead.” Now that the low hanging fruit that has enabled hotels to claim they are going green has been picked, it is time for hotel companies to evolve their sustainability programs in order to address the new phase of challenges and opportunities they currently face.

After several years of running environmental programs, hotels need to evaluate if their current organizational structures supporting these projects continue to be effective. Early green programs were often developed in the Environmental, Health, and Safety department. Their initiatives to protect workers and the Earth from dangerous chemicals evolved into projects to reduce waste and operating costs. Other sustainability programs were managed by the social responsibility team, run through the Human Resources department, which focused on giving back to the community. As a result, many sustainability officers now reside in Operations or HR. These alignments made perfect sense ten years ago when changing out light bulbs and cleaning up local parks represented major sustainability programs within a lot of hotels. The benefits of these initiatives are real but, as our world enters a new era where stakeholders are demanding more transparency and third party certifications are evolving and becoming a requirement to conduct business, keeping these programs in their original locations is often limiting.

Sustainability has evolved into a much deeper practice than many business leaders initially believed was possible. It is a tool and philosophy that can be applied strategically to every department, from the new hotel design team and franchise relations to the sales, marketing, and food services groups. By using the lens of sustainability, it is possible to uncover new data points to track and reveal previously unseen metrics about current key indicators. Rather than having Operations or HR staff trying to implement sustainability goals for other departments, hotels need corporate sustainability officers that operate out of their own unique department and are empowered to assess and coach all other departments within the organization. Some hotel companies are realizing this and 2011 has seen the development of several new or revamped sustainability director and officer positions residing within environmental or sustainability departments. This organizational realignment will greatly increase the ability of hotels to address the new challenges faced by environmental teams in all industries, such as managing a green supply chain and deciphering what consumers will want one year from now.

Once these roles are established, hotels need to find visionary leaders who can inspire, educate, and spark excitement for sustainability from within the organization. One of their main tasks will be convincing departmental leaders that sustainability is not just another passing trend but a valid business model with real benefits. Each department within a hotel company should work with the sustainability officers to define how environmentalism affects their team, develop a clear strategy with measurable goals, and then create a plan to achieve their objectives. This will ensure sustainability goals are not in conflict with more traditional hotel aims of increasing occupancy and revenue per available room (RevPAR).

The bottom line according to the TVR survey is that “Only three companies (Accor, InterContinental Hotels Group, and Marriott) seem to see sustainability management as important for protecting and creating commercial value.” Recently announced programs are showing progress and are very encouraging. The Carbon Measurement Working Group, formed by the International Tourism Partnership and the World Travel & Tourism Council, has pulled together ten major players in the hotel industry and is working to standardize how carbon is measured and reported. Hilton Worldwide has earned ISO 9001 and ISO 14001 certifications for all if its brands. Their programs should be applauded as well as emulated by other hotel companies. These examples make it clear that hotels can engage with sustainability in a deeper, more strategic way. As they do so, they will move the hospitality industry into the next phase of sustainability: one defined by strategic, proactive decisions instead of reactionary measures.

This article is cross-posted on Triple Pundit.

Zero waste is a movement that aims to minimize the material that goes into landfills by recycling or composting most items. It is the next generation of traditional recycling and a sustainability initiative, which I recently implemented as my company’s Green Committee chair. After months of planning, it was very exciting to launch the program in late spring. Now that we have the summer behind us, I am taking the time to reflect on lessons learned and following up on my promise to share how our zero waste project has been running.

The program was rolled out in the corporate headquarters of an international software company and is the first zero waste implementation to be put in place within a large office building in our state.  The transition to a zero waste system in an office building, specifically collecting compost, involves a significant cultural change on behalf of the employees and management. We knew our leadership team was on board when after being pitched the idea last fall, our CEO asked, “Why would we not launch a program like this?” With his endorsement in our hands, the Green Committee began turning our focus to our 200 colleagues.

Six months before we began seriously entertaining the idea of a full-scale zero waste initiative, we had used our Green Leaves educational program to provide employees with information about home composting. We placed paper leaves throughout the office that read, “Reduce trash, save money on garbage and lawn bags, and create great soil by composting organic scraps. For more info go to: www.HowToCompost.org“. Over the weeks that followed, Green Committee members made it a point to discuss the many virtues of composting with anyone who asked us a question, commented on the green leaf, or just happened to be standing next to us in the kitchen. Some people said they remembered their grandparents composting on the family farm fifty years ago and were surprised that the practice is becoming popular once again. Several people expressed concern over the odor and were very surprised when a few Green Committee members began keeping small compost bins at their desks to collect fruit and vegetables waste from themselves and their neighbors to bring home with them at the end of each day. We soon realized that compost can be a touchy subject and would most likely be our biggest challenge moving our zero waste plans forward.

After priming the pump with our suggestion that employees consider composting at home, during the annual Kick Off Meeting in February, I announced to the entire company that a zero waste initiative would be implemented in 2011. I officially unveiled the program several months later at our spring quarterly meeting by defining zero waste and explaining we had contracted a local company that was, at the time, providing zero waste hauling to over thirty area restaurants. I had one of the two customized zero waste stations we had purchased for each kitchen in our office with me in the meeting and used it to help me education people on the types of items that should be placed into each bin. Finally, I our displayed the names of all Green Committee members and asked employees to seek these people out with their questions and comments about the program.

The most complicated part of our implementation is the variety of bins we provide employees. Traditional zero waste programs include three options: Recycling, Compost, and Landfill. We chose to include two additional collections in our zero waste station, Cans and Bottles, and Mixed Paper, because during the past three years, these items have been taken away for free by local companies. The cans and bottles are collected by a local charity that turns them in to collect the deposit and all of our paper is collected by a business that has been recycling scrap metal and mixed paper in our region for twenty years. The Green Committee began working with him four years ago when our company moved offices and encouraged employees to recycle the paper they were getting rid of before the move. The free price tag comes with a request that we sort the paper ourselves so we have set up bins throughout the office to capture the paper in four groups: white copy paper, chipboard, cardboard, and all other paper (colored, glossy, etc.)

Not only would our new zero waste hauler, Eco-Movement, charge us for removing paper, cans, and bottles from our building, we would be asking employees to change a collection system that has worked well for years. By continuing the current process and adding composting to the mix, we chose to partner with three local organizations instead of one, save money, and make the transition to zero waste easier for the employees.

Almost immediately after launching the program, we began making adjustments. Prior to zero waste, we had been told by our facilities department they were unable to secure wooden coffee stirrers. Knowing this, we made sure to point out that the plastic coffee stirrers needed to be placed into the landfill bin. After one week the Green Committee received so many requests for wooden coffee stirrers from employees , including the Vice President of Human Resources, who were concerned about the impact adding plastic coffee stirrers to the landfill has on the environment that we went back to our facilities manager and asked him to widen his search for wooden coffee stirrers. After another week, we had completely discontinued using plastic coffee stirrers are now purchasing wooden coffee stirrers which can be composted.

The lessons I have learned from developing and launching this zero waste program revolve around ease of use and listening to employees. Making the program easy and optional allowed employees to begin fully utilizing the system soon after it was launched and harnessed the power of peer pressure rather than the mandate of the Green Committee to persuade the folks who were reticent of participating to give it a try. Stressing our hope for feedback and then acting on the information we received was key. If you are about to launch a zero waste program, I suggest gathering all changes and clarifications during the first two weeks of the initiative and then communicating them all at once though a zero waste update email. Finally, sending out a survey after the program has been running for several months is an important way to see to what degree employees have internalized the idea of zero waste. We plan to poll our colleagues soon and I will be back to let you know what we learn.

This is the second of three posts that provide Jamie’s answers to several questions I recently posed to her regarding sustainability education.

Can you please explain the distinction between educating about sustainability and educating for sustainability?

What people don’t always realize is that educating for sustainability is not always about sustainability. It is first and foremost about developing the knowledge and the ways of thinking that will help us to thrive over time.

It is clear that people educating for sustainability do not all have a shared vocabulary with shared meanings.

The Cloud Institute’s framework for Education for Sustainability is designed to contribute to our individual and collective potential and that of the living systems upon which our lives depend.

When we educate about sustainability we treat sustainability as a topic. In my opinion, its use strictly as a topic is limiting and does not allow for what I believe is its highest and best use. To us, sustainability and regeneration are the names for the desired condition we are educating for. I think the greatest value to us is that the concepts of sustainability and regeneration are aspirational and measurable destinations.

Why have you chosen to focus your efforts on K – 12?

The Cloud Institute believes that a sustainable community agenda is unsustainable if it doesn’t formally involve all the children, young people and their teachers. We unite schools and communities to learn and change together  to instigate, sustain, and scale up the innovations and best practices that contribute to sustainability and that characterize Education for Sustainability. We can accelerate the shift toward Sustainability by engaging the schools in Education for Sustainability and securing the role of children and young people as participants, innovators and leaders. We believe that K-12 education can substantially influence knowledge, skills, attitudes and behaviors related to sustainability. This is the most fertile ground for helping to shape a society committed to sustainable development.

In the most serious conversations about sustainability, I have not detected a shared understanding of the role of education, particularly K-12, in contributing to the shift toward a sustainable future. I have spoken to system dynamics modelers who assume that the time horizon for the return on an investment in K-12 education is twenty years. When I hear that, I ask them, “Do you know any children?!” In my experience, it takes children and young people very little time (especially compared to adults) to turn what they’ve learned into action at the local level.  On average, they are much more responsive, creative, and quicker to make change than we adults are.

Many people have given up on public schools and yet we keep sending the majority of our children there. It is a bad scenario. We can either give up on them and create something else instead, or we can transform them into learning organizations that contribute to our children’s individual and collective potential and that of the living systems upon which our lives depend  (we actually like a bit of both.) We cannot, I would argue, continue to send the majority of our nation’s children to places for thirteen years of their lives that we have abandoned financially, psychologically and emotionally.  That’s just a disaster. That’s part of the problem. I’ll say that upfront.

This is the first of three posts that provide Jamie’s answers to several questions I recently posed to her regarding sustainability education.

When and how were you inspired to develop “a different way of thinking”?

[JPC] – I was in one of the first experiments in global education from the 6th-12th grades.  As a result, my work began at the age of 11.  I grew up in Evanston, Illinois.  Our teachers were influenced by Buckminster Fuller and other luminaries of the time. The gist of the experiment was to prepare us to thrive in the 21st Century, to become agents of change and inventors of the future we want.  They provided us  with learner-centered, constructivist methodologies  that produced reflective, flexible and creative questioners, systems thinkers, lateral thinkers, media literate, self-regulated learners prepared to deal with rapid change, increasing complexity and interdependence, uncertainty, diversity, and global challenges, including the environment, peace and security, human rights and human development.

In middle school, I could not have predicted that I would be a founder of the field of Education for Sustainability.  The term sustainability and sustainable development, as we understand it today, would not be coined until 1987, nineteen years later, and the field of Education for Sustainability would not be born until 1992 in Chapter 36 of Agenda 21—some 24 years later.

I grew up to become a Global Educator because that’s what I knew.  In 1987, when the word sustainability appeared in a U.N. report, Our Common Future, I thought to myself, “That’s the name for the desired condition I want to educate for.” I had been tracking the state of the planet data since 1968—since I was 11.  Now I had a word to describe what I saw:  The situation was un-sustainable for humans and other species of plants and animals with which we share the planet.  Sustain-able seemed like a better idea.  Once I had the word, I had the concept. Once I had the concept, I knew I needed to educate for sustainability.

Shortly thereafter, I came across an Einstein quote that we use daily: “The significant problems we face cannot be solved with the same level of thinking that we used to create them. “

This article is cross-posted on Environmental Leader.

Spending a day at the local waterpark has become a popular pastime for families across the globe. From Pakistan to Poland and Uruguay to the United States, millions of people enjoy cooling off in wave pools and slipping down water slides when the weather heats up. Last week I went to a waterpark with my family and was surprised to see no visible signs of energy efficiency or water conservation. It made me realize that not all sectors of the economy are embracing the current sustainability trend but reminded me that even an industry seemingly at odds with environmentalism can begin moving toward a greener future.

Water has refreshed and sustained humans since the dawn of time but today’s large-scale waterparks are a 20^th century invention. There are currently about 1000 waterparks and pools with water features in the US and approximately 600 more waterparks around the world. The iconic Wet’nWild park in Orlando, FL opened in 1977 and is considered to have started the trend of large, multi-feature parks.

Most US waterparks are members of the World Waterpark Association (WWA). The WWA is the leading organization within the waterpark industry, but they are not the leading the way toward sustainability.  Their website offers potential members a variety of benefits, including learning how to keep staff motivated and trained, and finding out how to influence legislation that regulates the industry. Protecting the environment and reducing the use of natural resources are not mentioned at all. In a country that has seen almost every item and service imaginable “go green” over the past five years, the WWA’s claim of helping members “understand and stay ahead of the trends that impact the recreation industry and your business” falls short by their failure to include guidelines on how to incorporate today’s sustainable business theories into practice. Conservation efforts are now expected by many consumers and the sooner a company develops and implements its green programs, the sooner they can share their efforts with the public. From this perspective, the WWA is not providing leadership to its members.

Of the many ways waterparks can incorporate sustainability into their operations, reducing their resource consumption is often the simplest place to begin. In a talk I saw last year, CEYo of Stonyfield Farm Gary Hirshberg spoke about the “first bank of conservation.” Implementing resource reduction programs is the initial step most companies take on their path to sustainability. These initiatives save energy and raw materials while banking money that has historically been wasted through inefficient operating procedures and lack of employee education. This is a classic win-win scenario that organizations in all industries can roll out. Waterparks are no different and some are taking the lead in an industry that seems to have its head under water when it comes to the benefits of going green.

In China many businesses have embraced sustainability and at least one waterpark is no exception. In East Huzhou City, MCM Group International is designing a new waterpark for children.  Their founder and CEO, Michael C. Mitchell, wants the park to respect the natural environment and be an example of sustainable design. To achieve these goals, the park will utilize a variety of tools to clean its water, including a non-invasive micron filtration system along with ozone and carbon technologies. This method will leave the water clean and free of chemicals, particularly chlorine which has been linked to numerous negative health effects.

Closer to home, the Chaos Water Park in Eau Claire, WI, is using sphagnum moss to keep its water clean. This allows them to apply 90% fewer pool chemicals. It also means that instead of needing to flush their park with one and a half million gallons of water throughout the year, they can now get by with just 150,000 gallons. In addition to this savings, much of the water that previously left the facility as waste water is now being cleaned with moss filtration devices they purchase from Creative Water Solutions. This permits Chaos to recycle their water back into the park, saving them an additional 375,000 gallons of water every three months. Chaos Water Park is a fantastic example of an industry leader that could be sharing their resource and cost saving strategy with waterparks around the globe.

All waterparks could play a local leadership role by working to develop regional legislation that adopts an increasingly common trend among water treatment systems. Despite their stomach turning moniker, “toilet to tap” methods could provide clean water to waterparks and lead our nation into a new paradigm of municipal water reclamation that reuses household waste water. Although San Diego residents refused to support the development of this water recovery system, Washington D.C. has been turning household waste water into potable water since the late 1970’s and Singapore is increasingly using treated waste water for residential use.

Each and every industry must incorporate sustainability in order to protect the natural world, its people, and their cultures. Businesses must also ensure they remain relevant to their consumers or risk going the way of Borders, who failed to embrace ebooks and went bankrupt earlier this year partly because of their hesitancy to work with this new technology. In a recent study entitled Consumer 2020: Reading the Signs, Deloitte predicts companies need to play an even more aggressive role in moving sustainability across our country. One of report’s conclusions is that “consumer businesses have a crucial and central role in pro-actively influencing consumers to lead more sustainable lifestyles and choose sustainable products and services…”

A natural starting point for waterparks and other industries that have only just begun to work with sustainability is implementing conservation efforts. This is low hanging fruit that all companies should pick because it saves natural resources, reduces their operating costs, and allows them to start fulfilling the leadership role they must embrace.

The water was still in the 50s during my first body surfing day in early June and I stood alone off the coast in New Hampshire. Today the sun was hot and I shared the ocean with many others; the handful of twelve year old boys with boundless energy catching every wave they could, the paddle boarders who crouched as they rode the waves and looked to me as if they were performing an ancient ceremony, the screaming children learning to bodyboard in the surf, and the bearded rider in a fedora and sunglasses. I felt the energy of sea in the gentle pushes it gave me as I let smaller waves pass by. I closed my eyes and felt myself being cleansed by the sun and salt. I felt at peace and at home.

Nature entrances us because as a species we were born and raised within it. We are bound to the environment in literally every breath we take and it seems fitting that the calm and joy I experienced today was a result of being present with the natural world. For millennia, humans lived, worked, and celebrated surrounded by nature. Now our daily routines involve office buildings and cars, and often leave us with a gap that used to be filled with the spiritual essence of the natural cycles of life. Technology creates miracles and moves us forward ever faster yet strips us the still moments our souls require to maintain our connection with the Earth.

Each hour I spend outside is full of healing. The salvation I seek in the woods and the water is an antidote to the time I spend on my laptop. It brings me back into alignment with the cycles of life and reminds me that spending time in nature is an integral part of the human experience.

This article is cross-posted on Environmental Leader.

In my recent article, The Promise of Sustainability Education, I discussed the importance of introducing whole systems thinking and environmental sustainability into the US educational system. There are a variety of organizations using a range of methods to bring sustainability pedagogy into today’s schools. In this interview, David Miller from Enclave Harbour discusses the role virtual worlds can play in the transition to sustainability education.

MC: How long have you been developing virtual worlds and when did you get the idea to create Enclave Harbour?

DM: I started working in virtual worlds at the end of 2006 when Second Life was all the frenzy in the media.  I had been doing Blender 3D, an open source 3D animation program, as a hobby and saw the opportunity to make buildings that could be used by others. My first project was an art gallery for a Norwegian artist that was having a real life art reception and wanted it mirrored in Second Life.

I was interested in using Second Life for teaching science but it was far too expensive and Second Life does not allow anyone under 16 years of age to enter. However, I did use Second Life to teach eLearning developers how to “film” 3D animation, much like you would do with the much harder to learn Blender 3D.

MC: What are the advantages of teaching earth science “in world”?

DM: Immersion and engagement. The concepts I have students explore in these virtual science field trips have traditionally been taught with illustrations or photographs in a text book. If you are lucky, then maybe you can see a video or even a 3D projector image. All we are doing with Enclave Harbour is taking that illustration or photo and making it a 3D model that a student can walk around in.

It’s more fun to have an avatar and walk around a desalination plant or a landfill then to read about it. Kids love to explore, even if it is just virtually. Most kids won’t ever participate in a field trip to hydro-electric plant or calculate the kinetic energy of a toilet they flush atop of the world’s tallest building as captured by a wastewater turbine.

You can also teach the fantastical. We have a space station that teaches closed-circuit systems like the water cycle and the carbon cycle and we also have a spaceship that serves as a way to discuss future energy possibilities – those topics that are just fun to explore.

“In-world” activities can also be enjoyed by those at brick-and-mortar schools, virtual schools, and home schools.

MC: Was it a conscious choice to use a variety of alternative energy solutions within Enclave Harbour?

DM: We teach Environmental Science topics using Life, Earth, and Physical Science principles taken from the National Science Education Standards (NSES) and from the Trends in International Mathematics and Science Study (TIMSS). In this mix it seems appropriate to teach all forms of energy being used. We teach science and not policy and in this respect there is no right or wrong energy.

However, since we do this with an eye towards closing the gender gap in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM), we do present activities designed in a way that students do their own research on current events and can write papers on differing topics. The goal is for them to uncover various sides of issues and to question assumptions presented by the media. They will make up their own minds about energy solutions and be better equipped to make sound decisions regarding them as they become older.

MC: How can youth best be educated on sustainability?

DM: I think that today’s youth is on the verge of this question becoming a moot one for them. We have seen significant changes in the last five years in the automobile industry and recent incentives, such as San Francisco allowing the free charging of electric cars, that are now making these things a day-to-day reality and not simply novel.

I believe that science literacy can help us become sustainable in our lives and our decisions. Science literacy in the US is lower than in many countries and we are now aware of this. Science needs to be restored to its former glory of the days when dreaming of space travel was something many kids did. Today we have no planned manned missions and the lunar walk is from a time way before today’s kids were born. The romantic side of science is not as bright as it could be.

Personally, I blame standardized testing to an extent because it removes some of the reward for passionate science teachers who want to teach but get ranked on their ability to have students memorize facts. Rote memorization might look good for test results but we can see that this does not inspire great science nor does it allow the US to lead the world in science innovation.

I taught three years at the secondary level and seven at college but I would not teach secondary science unless it was at a very progressive school that valued enthusiasm, passion, and real life experience.

MC: What is the most important actionable item you would like readers to take away?

DM: Question science that you hear in the media. It is sometimes pseudo-science presented to further a political agenda that may sound plausible but falls apart upon cursory inspection.

Science is all around us, it’s in your cell phone, the water you drink, the transportation you use, and science is magical and sometimes invisible. From pollination to hurricanes to sail boats, wind is an important “thing” that we have studied and understand very well but have you ever actually seen the wind?

This article is cross-posted on Environmental Leader.

The educational system in the United States once ranked among the best in the world, but the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s (OECD) most recent statistics show the US produced only average proficiency scores when compared against other countries in science, reading, and math. We now have a unique opportunity to regain our practice of effective teaching and prepare our youth for a rapidly changing future by incorporating environmental sustainability and social responsibility into all aspects of our educational system.

The current paradigm which pushes businesses and people to do more with less, and at increasing speeds, is transforming into a model aligned with the laws of nature. In this new world there is virtually no waste and people and planet are treated as more than raw materials, they are honored as the fabric of life itself. In order to make the transition, our youth must be exposed to and educated on whole systems thinking with the natural world as the ultimate guide. While a handful of school districts, private institutions, and universities are making great progress, many continue to teach more or less as they have for years.

A positive example for how to develop sustainability pedagogy can be found at The Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education. This New York City based non-profit has developed a holistic approach that involves the individual student along with his or her classroom, school, and community. Known as Education for Sustainability (EfS), this learner-centered method works with the primary influences in the lives of students, knowing that true, long-term change is most easily attained when nearly all major influences support the new vision. The idea that a person’s surroundings will have to transform in order to support the much needed true shift in our cultural values is a powerful concept and exactly what will be required. Just as important is the Cloud Institute’s distinction as to the focus of their work. They are involved in “educating for sustainability, rather than about sustainability.”

Founded in 1995, the Cloud Institute offers a variety of services designed to enable sustainability, including long-term consulting, teacher workshops, and curriculum development. A great example of their work can be seen in The TerraCycle Curriculum Series. Lesson plans, story books, and student handouts are free to download and provide ready to use materials for educators. The Natural Laws and Principles of the Materials Cycle curriculum uses a story, Where Do Apples Go, to explain what happens to organic and non-organic material when thrown on the ground outside. The Healthy Commons program introduces children to the concept of shared resources, such as air, water, and community parks and begins to explore the responsibility we all have for these communal necessities of life.

While organizations like The Cloud Institute are focused solely on educating for sustainability, others include environmental protection as one piece of a larger mission. The Marion Institute works with communities, schools, and individuals on green economics and environmental education in addition to health, healing, and spirituality. They have launched four Seed to Table programs that link classroom experiences with the time children spend in the garden. The Marion Institute also aids schools in developing composting programs and providing field trip opportunities to visit local farms and green industries.

Sustainability field trips of another kind will soon be possible at Enclave Harbor. This well-designed virtual world has a variety of alternative energy and environmental science activities from solar-powered cargo blimps to tidal turbines and even a landfill. A workbook guides students through life, earth, and physical science virtual field trips with a focus on sustainability.

One well known real world school that has incorporated sustainability in a variety of ways is Phillips Exeter Academy. They developed an environmental mission statement in 2004 and, in 2005, fourteen staff members participated in a four-day workshop to learn how to infuse their teaching with environmental education. Today Phillips Exeter offers eight courses with a strong sustainability focus that cover topics ranging from English to science to religion. Students also have the opportunity to leave campus and explore sustainability in the larger world. Available programs are based in the mountains of Vermont; in Callan, Ireland; and at The Island School in the Bahamas.

While on campus, students who are interested can become Environmental Proctors. E-Proctors, as they are known, have a variety of responsibilities, including educating their fellow dorm mates on energy efficiency and conservation along with placing the composting pail outside the building each morning for pickup. Charging youth with these types of responsibilities has numerous advantages. The E-Proctors gain valuable experiences championing and managing environmental initiatives by promoting and supporting sustainability measures to their peers. Challenging students to live a life full of green measures solidifies important environmental habits, such as composting and turning off lights, preparing the Phillips Exeter community for stewardship of the natural world long after graduation.

Today, youth who are interested in sustainability have the opportunity to further their studies in both undergrad and graduate programs. Many traditional business colleges include triple bottom line course work and there has been a steady increase in “green MBAs.” The Presidio Graduate School offers both an MBA and MPA in Sustainable Management. Their integration of sustainability into every course ensures students are steeped in environmental and social responsibility. Being surrounded by green class work and real-life examples of sustainability in action allows students to become business leaders that see the world in new way.

The promise of sustainability education is a well trained, insightful workforce that views the natural world as a precious resource and all people as worthy of fair and equal participation in the global economy. If our nation looks to the examples of sustainability education currently in use and invests time and money into incorporating these holistic, whole systems ideals into a redesigned teaching model, our lagging educational system will begin to produce results that will benefit the entire world.

The Green Committee, which I founded and lead at my company, has been developing an initiative for Zero Waste. Today I met with our building’s facilities manager to discuss the partnership I have forged with EcoMovement Consulting & Hauling. They are a local company who will soon collect our recyclables and compost – a move that excites me to no end – making our company’s facility the first large office building in coastal NH to pursue Zero Waste by “reducing and reusing, then composting and recycling what’s left.”

Our facilities manager told me that she just launched a single stream program with Waste Management at one of the other buildings her company manages. She said if all goes well, in a few months Waste Management will be contracted to pick up my company’s recycling as well. She was happy to tell me that EcoMovement could still collect our compost and went on to explain that for her it would be much easier to have one vendor provide hauling services to the several dozen properties she oversees.

I suddenly saw the position she was in and wondered what I would do. I had specifically sought alternatives to Waste Management when creating our Zero Waste program. If I was managing multiple locations, would I continue to follow my strong inclination to support local vendors or would I instead employ the national company that I had been using for years?

The complexity of any project increases when more stakeholders are involved. Finding a vendor that provides enterprise-wide service reduces logistics, contracts, and cost. But with size comes limitations and, sometimes, with experience comes lack of innovation. In this case the local startup would have my business over the national Goliath. Here’s why.

The primary reason I would choose to work with EcoMovement over Waste Management is for the breadth of services they offer. EcoMovement is a zero waste enabling organization that actually began as a sustainability consulting firm. They morphed into a hauling company when they saw the need for better waste management in Portsmouth, NH, and kept their educational philosophy with them.

EcoMovement prides itself on working with its clients to develop an implementation plan that will ensure the customer’s employees adopt the Zero Waste program. They offers signage and guidelines to educate people on what to recycle in which bin and how composting works. After enabling their clients to build a strong framework for pursuing Zero Waste, EcoMovement steps back and encourages each company to strive for Zero Waste in their own way. Their website boasts photos of end users expressing their interest in working toward minimal trash generation and a video that highlights some of EcoMovement’s local partners.  The owners of this startup take their work so seriously that if on pick up day they notice one company’s trash tote contains recyclables, they make sure to speak with the managers to see how they can help develop additional methods to support employees’ efforts to achieve Zero Waste.

The second reason for my choosing the local vendor is that Waste Management does not use dedicated recycling centers, locations that specialize in recovering recyclable items. This means that some of the paper, plastics, and aluminum they collect goes into landfills. Even if this practice only happens occasionally, which is what my facilities manager told me, I believe that is too often. The problem is that Waste Management has not invested in enough recycling centers and putting the recyclables their clients have taken the time to rinse and sort in with the rest of the trash is not acceptable. If Waste Management tells clients they can collect recyclables, they need to ensure these items are indeed recycled. EcoMovement brings their non-compostable material to the dedicated recycling facility in southern Maine where it is properly recycled 100 percent of the time and the compost to their own compost facility in NH.

Finally, while Waste Management invested in national compost facilities expert Harvest Power in early 2010, they do not appear to collect compost at this point in time. My organization began recycling when the Green Committee was launched in mid-2007 and pursuing Zero Waste has been a discussion for at least the past eighteen months. To work with a vendor that allows us to compost enables us take the next step on our sustainability journey.

It would most likely take a full year to transition dozens of properties from Waste Management to EcoMovement or a similar, local based and highly dedicated recycling company. I am confident that after twelve months, the process of adopting Zero Waste or single stream would be much further along using a vendor that offers implementation planning and recycling education as part of its services. In the end, each employee will make the decision to recycle and compost or not but rolling out a program designed to engage workers gives the entire project a much better chance for success. As my team gears up for the launch of our Zero Waste initiative, we are making sure to keep engagement a top priority. I am very interested in seeing how our program is accepted and internalized when it is rolled out on April 22, 2011 and I’ll write another article letting you all know how it goes.