It’s been 20 years since Last Child in the Woods helped ignite a national conversation about the vital need to connect young people with nature. Since then, the case for outdoor learning has only grown stronger thanks to research, personal experience, and a growing awareness of climate and environmental justice.
This spring, Remake Learning convened a group of educators, community leaders, and advocates to participate in an Outdoor Learning Pulse Check, a series of gatherings focused on exploring how outdoor learning is being used in the region and how we might expand it together.
The Pulse Check aimed to determine whether there’s momentum and interest for launching a more sustained, collaborative effort around outdoor learning in the Pittsburgh region. And from the enthusiasm in the room, the answer seems to be yes.
Shared Purpose and Strong Foundations
The Pulse Check series, organized by Colleen Smith, brought together both in-school and out-of-school educators who already see the benefits of outdoor learning.
“No matter what angle they were coming to outdoor learning and environmental education from, they all came into the room seeing all of the physical and mental benefits, the environmental concerns and especially the need for equity. Rarely do you convene a group that hasn’t come together before and find so much foundational consensus already established,” says Smith.
To guide the discussion, participants began with a working definition:
“Outdoor learning includes learning experiences in the outdoors and learning about the natural world.”
That could include a science class observing living organisms outside, a literature class reading under a tree, or simply unstructured time outdoors where learning emerges naturally. A topic brief, shared in advance of the sessions, also offered a set of “provocative questions”:
- In what ways might stronger partnerships with community organizations, businesses, funders, and parks enhance outdoor learning?
- How can we harness technology—without overshadowing the natural experience—to deepen outdoor engagement?
- How do we ensure equitable access to high-quality outdoor learning?
- What small, bold experiments can we try today to embed outdoor learning into school culture?
- How do we measure and celebrate learning that happens outside traditional academic metrics?
Pittsburgh, the brief noted, is uniquely positioned to lead in this space: Home to a culture of educational innovation, rich natural environments, and a history of environmental leadership, including Rachel Carson’s legacy.
Initial Insights
While participation was open, the goal was to engage those who were already invested in outdoor learning as educators, nonprofit leaders, or advocates.
“We wanted to make sure that we were reaching the population that is really in the outdoor learning spaces, though we were very, very open to that being broadly defined,” says Smith. “It could be that it was a business or something that intersects with outdoor learning. Maybe you’re not an outdoor learning educator, but it matters to you if we have an environmentally-literate citizenry to address some of the problems that are coming up. So there wasn’t really anyone that we were wanting to keep out, but we wanted to make sure that we could dig in with the population.”
Equity, accessibility, and environmental justice emerged as core themes across the two in-person gatherings.
“There was no push for dominance,” Smith notes. “I didn’t get a sense that any one group thought ‘our part is the one we really need to focus on.’ They all were looking to work on the overarching important pieces. They talked about accessibility across the board. They talked about inclusivity across the board and they talked about equity across the board.”
This collaborative spirit isn’t new. Smith pointed to the creation of the Pennsylvania STEEL Standards, a shared environmental education framework developed by a coalition of school-based and out-of-school educators, as an example of what’s possible when the region works together.
“This collection of environmental educators—in school and out of school—saw an opportunity, and they worked collectively to make it happen. They said if we’re going to have all the benefits of nature and the outdoors, and if we’re going to keep the planet, we’ve got to do this in a way that future generations have the understanding and have the ability they need to be able to approach learning differently.”
What Comes Next
Across the sessions, participants expressed optimism and a strong desire to continue building momentum. A whitepaper summarizing the Pulse Check will be published on Remake Learning’s website and shared with participants later this summer.
But Smith also noted a clear takeaway for future engagement efforts.
“The initial effort to gather participants was too centered on established relationships. There is a really strong environmental justice contingency in Pittsburgh and we did not have enough people from the marginalized communities who really are impacted by environmental justice.”
Scheduling proved to be a barrier for some potential participants. “We couldn’t say ‘Get this on your calendar three months in advance,’ so that precluded the involvement of a number of people from communities that we really wanted to reach,” she said.
“So while much of what we gleaned is on point, and the process was targeted and intended to be inclusive, there are some gaps,” she says. “The number one thing is to look at next steps to developing those relationships within the communities and centering the leadership from those communities in what develops.”
Authored by:
Melissa Rayworth
Melissa Rayworth has spent two decades writing about the building blocks of modern life — how we design our homes, raise our children and care for elderly family members, how we interact with pop culture in our marketing-saturated society, and how our culture tackles (and avoids) issues of social justice and the environment.