KAEE 2024 Conference

KAEE is continuing its efforts to establish a network of Kentucky higher education professionals engaged in environmental education (EE) across disciplines (aquatics, biology, early childhood, education, forestry, geology, recreation, natural resources, wildlife, etc.). This network is intended to provide EE and EE-adjacent higher education staff and faculty channels and opportunities to convene, collaborate, and partner at the local level and across the state.

Logistics:

• Pre-registration is required during conference registration at kaee.org/conference.
• Virtual or Summit-only attendees can register here.

Is your EE program stuck? Do you want to expand your programming and increase your participation but are having trouble attracting new audiences? In this session we will use The Parklands of Floyds Fork S.E.E.D. program as a case study for program growth and capacity building.

The Outdoor Classroom program at The Parklands of Floyds Fork began in 2014 serving students throughout the Louisville, KY area. However, The Parklands quickly realized they were only serving schools that were able to afford the field trip fee. Schools who could not afford this fee were generally not participating. Upon further investigation of this issue, The Parklands found that both the field trip fee and the cost of bus transportation were the primary factors preventing students in Title 1 schools from visiting The Parklands for a field trip.

To address these barriers, The Parklands started the S.E.E.D. (Stewardship, Education, Exploration, Discovery) program. Students in the S.E.E.D. program attend Title 1 schools in the Louisville area and receive at least four hands-on science programs throughout the school year at The Parklands and in their schools. The Parklands waives all program fees and pays for bus transportation to and from the park. The S.E.E.D. program started in 2016 serving 900 students and is on track to serve 11,500 students in 2024.

This program was born by directly addressing the barriers to program participation in the Louisville community. The growth of this program did not happen overnight and required effective grant writing, planning and the cultivating of deep partnerships between The Parklands and the public school system. During this session, we hope to share the story of S.E.E.D. growth with other EE programs that are looking to expand their audience, grow their program capacity, and incorporate new audiences.

Activities
1. Story of S.E.E.D.- presenting the successes, failures, and challenges during program growth
2. Small group discussion - participants work in small groups to identify barriers to program participation in their own programs and potential ideas to break down those barriers.
3. Group presentation and Q and A- small groups will present their ideas and receive feedback from the group.

Learning Objectives
1. Participants will identify barriers to program participation for their audience- including things like transportation, program cost, and access to healthy food.
2. Participants will brainstorm ideas on how to eliminate the identified barriers to program participation through dialogue and discussion between peers.
3. Through coaching, participants will form ideas on how to break down the identified barriers to take back to their organization.

Nonformal education sites offer enriching educational experiences for students. The McDowell Farm School (MFS) exemplifies this by providing students with immersive encounters in a working farm environment. Despite their educational value, many nonformal education sites lack sufficient evidence of their impact. This session presents a research study aimed at evaluating the effectiveness of MFS programs on visiting students. By utilizing pre-visit/post-visit surveys and interviews, this study provides valuable insights into program efficacy and offers transferable evaluation methods for similar nonformal education programs. This session will explore the study’s methodology, findings, and implications to contribute to a deeper understanding of program evaluation in nonformal education contexts. This will be done using results and survey responses taken from the visit to the MFS that document the program’s impact on participants’ knowledge, attitudes, and behavior. By showcasing the positive impact of MFS on students and providing transferable evaluation methods, the session advances our understanding of the value of experiential learning beyond traditional educational settings.
The research study utilized the EE21 survey as part of the program evaluation to document program impacts of the MPS on visiting students. The EE21 is available for other EE program providers to use. Researchers will share how the survey can be validated and used for program evaluations of conference attendees allowing them to include this valuable tool in their own program evaluations.