POLLUTION SOLUTION
Environmental Education Program
Community Partnership
Our community partners are two Denver public schools, Cole Arts and Science Academy (CASA) and Garden Place Academy, both of which have science curricula in need of support and historically underserved student populations. We worked with their respective principals, Meredith Brown and Andrea Renteria, to develop an afterschool program that fits their needs and the needs of their student population. We visited CASA and talked to a class of second-grade students about what they care about in nature, and they drew lots of pictures of animals and trees that we used as a basis for our plans. The students were very excited about the potential opportunity to spend time in nature and were happy to talk to us all about their favorite animals and their own experiences in nature. Additionally, we met with their teacher and the principals to frame the focus of the program. The partners will be the link between us and the students and help us acquire important resources like program space and parent support. They also expressed an interest in encouraging students to participate who are normally in after school care while their parents are at work. Our connection with our community partners was strong and continued to grow as we worked with them to accomplish our goals.
Principal Andrea Renteria
Garden Place Academy
Principal Meredith Brown
Cole Arts and Science Academy
Faculty Mentor
Paul Kosepmel
One of the Leadership Program professors at the University of Denver, Paul Kosempel volunteered to be our faculty mentor through the duration of our CCESL project. Without his support and guidance, our CCI project would not have made it as far as it has today.
Goals and Methods
Our CCI project had a few goals in mind when creating our program. We wanted to get kids out into nature who may not have access to it while educating them about the environment. One of our primary goals within that mission is to work with underprivileged children in the Denver area. Colorado is an incredible hub for beautiful nature and we want every child to experience it, but many kids do not have the necessary resources. That’s where we came in. Our after-school program brought kids into nature and allowed them to learn about the state they live in. Providing children this opportunity is vital for a community because if we want future generations to protect the environment, we need them to care about it. We have learned from previous encounters with elementary-aged children that they are interested in nature, and that desire is there, they just need help to reach it.
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Below, you can preview each week of our program and its set of activities. Click on the link to view each day more in-depth.
Outcomes
Most of our evidence for the outcomes of our project is anecdotal, but from the individual kids we talked to, they not only were more interested in nature and natural processes following our program, a couple of them said they want to spend more time outside near their homes and in other places.
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Following our project, there is also a potential opportunity to have pieces of our curriculum and plan adopted by the existing after school YMCA program at Garden Place Academy, as the infrastructure and relationships are there, but this is an outcome we would need to more fully explore.
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On a more reflective and personal note for our team, I think we all created friendships we didn’t previously have or at least deepened existing ones. I also think we learned a lot about what bureaucracy can look like and how hard it can be to work in fixed systems like public schools and University policies as outsiders or people unaccustomed to those roles.
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On a similar note, I also think this was a great team leadership experience for all of us as each of us stepped up in different ways and it never felt like we had one individual preaching or doling out assignments. Taking those lessons and applying them elsewhere could be deeply beneficial for us moving forward.
Lessons Learned
Bureaucracy is time-consuming
One of the most important and clear things we learned from our project is that bureaucracy is the enemy of efficiency. Despite our best efforts to streamline and organize our project to work on a timeline, bureaucracy consistently delayed our work, sometimes causing us to miss whole pieces altogether (like with finding buses).
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Always have a backup plan
Another important thing that we learned and were able to work around was having a backup plan. With the previously mentioned problems, we had to pivot very quickly, and because we were able to draft up some potential backup plans, we were able to work around our major issues and still have fun with the kids.
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Kids are people too, and want to be treated as such
This is something we remember from being kids, but forget about as we get older. When you’re the age that we were working with, having an adult treat you as an equal and as a friend is the best feeling in the world. And, while authority was used to make sure the kids were on task and respecting each other, we did our best to treat them as friends and people instead of just a liability for a few hours.
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Kids get excited when you’re excited
As we learned on the second Friday, even if you don’t have something super fun to do, kids will still be excited to learn when you’re excited and invested as well. Our second Friday was very rainy and, by most measurable standards, pretty boring, but Annabelle got on the topic of butterflies ( which she has experience with), and her passion was clearly heard in the way she talked about them, which meant the kids were also suddenly very interested in butterflies too.