Academic success

Motivation is essential for all teachers and specifically for environmental educators. Research has concluded that motivation affects teaching quality and student outcomes in environmental education (EE). Research has also proved that organizational practices can affect an employee's motivation and subsequent performance across sectors. Though many studies have been conducted on EE and professional development for environmental educators, not much is known about the organizational influences on a teacher's motivation to perform at their peak level.

As children become less connected to nature, the need for outdoor spaces in schools is more important than ever. Garden-based learning (GBL) is one teaching approach that gets students outdoors, and shares many of the same goals and strategies of environmental education (EE). GBL uses gardens to engage students in meaningful, participatory, and interdisciplinary activities. Several studies have demonstrated the importance of outdoor learning in promoting the physical and psychological well-being of children.

With the increasing intensity and frequency of environmental crises, environmental education (EE) is an essential tool for building the knowledge and capacity of students to foster a more sustainable relationship between humanity and the natural world. EE field trips outside of the classroom can engage students in novel ways to help them develop their environmental identity, skillset, and motivation to create pro-environmental change.

The UN Sustainable Development Goals established education for sustainable development (ESD) as a critical tool for addressing social inequality and environmental challenges. There has been a global push to implement the principles and practices of ESD, along with similar educational frameworks of development education (DE) and global citizenship education (GCED). The expansion of these three educational frameworks (DE/ESD/GCED) has required administrative effort and public spending by governments and educational institutions.

Education for sustainable development (ESD) is a framework that was developed by the United Nations for environmental educators around the world. The overall goal of ESD is to train students to think with interdisciplinarity and balance human dimensions like economy, society, and culture with Earth's natural dimensions when making development-related decisions. Quality education (QE) endeavors to develop individuals by providing valuable life skills and empowering students to reach their maximum potential.

Green schools are designed to reduce environmental resource consumption and facilitate learning. However, to date, limited research has examined the role of green schools in promoting education for sustainability (EfS). This study addressed this gap by exploring the relationship between green building design and EfS in the context of a university-middle school partnership.

Cultivating an environmentally literate citizenry is important to achieve sustainability, and universities are one place where students may gain these knowledge, skills, attitudes, and awareness. Student-athletes at the university level may have a greater negative impact on the environment than their peers, due in part to the travel and field maintenance. Because of this greater influence, they have the capacity to make even more significant changes to their lifestyle to become more sustainable.

Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) is a form of sustainability education in which students learn how to meet their needs for development in a sustainable manner while maintaining the ability for future generations to also meet their needs. Education regarding sustainability is important for understanding the increasing complexity around the natural environmental and sustainable development. Teaching about sustainability in schools can promote comprehension of these challenging topics. ESD programs have become more popular and more common over the past decade.

Publicly funded Environmental Education Center (EEC) programs exist in the United States, Canada, Australia, and many European Union countries. The authors defined EECs as places where the primary goal is to provide environmental education (EE) as a supplement to the education system. EEC networks in the US, Australia, Canada, and certain EU member countries are the most deeply established. In the US, Australia, and Canada, EECs receive economic and political support at varying levels by region, so the strength of their network and functions are not the same everywhere.

A team of researchers working with staff at Maryland's NorthBay Adventure Center (see related summary “Residential EE Program Yields Positive Results, Especially for Urban Participants” in the Teaching Methods section) set out to measure the impact of NorthBay programs on middle school students. The center offers five-day residential outdoor education programs with an environmental education curriculum based on the Investigating and Evaluating Environmental Issues and Actions (IEEIA) model.