Growing Change: Place-Based Participatory Partnerships in Education

• In Event: Roundtable Session 106
  In Roundtable Session: Conceptualizing New Beginnings: Philosophical, Cosmic, and Personal Implications of the Ecological

Abstract

As a part of growing and strengthening response to environmental and sustainability education initiatives, schoolyard gardens have emerged across the nation and globe. Though the concept of schoolyard gardens has received widespread support and ignited the public imagination, it is increasingly evident that there is an emergent need for place-based teaching models that allow for equitable access and programmatic continuity of such learning spaces. Our framework is that authentic community partnerships are intimate and intricate; therefore making the creation of sustainable partnerships a continuously negotiated and fragile space- not unlike the act of gardening itself. Within this framework, we imagine or re-imagine the role outdoor learning spaces play in enhancing the student- as well as community- experience through participatory inquiry.

Authors

• R. Justin Hougham, University of Idaho

• Francene Watson, Washington State University