Importance of Creating Great Outdoor Learning Spaces at Schools

Recently I was asked to share why the Tillman IGNITE project is important to me. It's been a busy couple weeks, so I procrastinated, of course. But, because I didn't have time to wordsmith, I found I was pretty darn honest with my response. And in the interest of using this platform more fully than I have in the past, I thought I'd share. So...

Lots of reasons I'm drawn to outdoor ed, experiential ed, and youth gardening. First, we HAVE to equip our kids to deal with tremendous environmental challenges--climate change, pollution, declining non-renewable resources, and a global population that exacerbates all of the aforementioned problems. Wow. How do we help our kids deal with all of that? I am not totally sure, but I do know that humans don't work to save what they don't love and that a space like IGNITE will inspire a connection to and hopefully love of nature. That is a necessary precursor to solving problems that will also require a good grasp of how systems work. And nature immersion is a great way to begin understanding systems and the complex interactions within and among systems. It seems to me that people are waking up to the fact that we need to raise "systems thinkers" in order to solve problems associated with climate change, and move away from education that fosters mainly reductionist thinking.

Why else? Well, kids need to know where food comes from and how much work it takes to produce it. They need to know that cheap food isn't all that cheap if we count the cost accurately (environmental and social). IGNITE's intensive/functional plants space + our current food gardens will help kids learn the basic, foundational skill of growing food. If they know how to grow food, they have the means of survival if needed and if not, they at least will respect the value of food.

Why else? This one is a bit harder to explain, but I'll give it a shot. I think the root cause for many of our social problems is the same as for our environmental problems. The same mindset that develops a food system that creates so many negative unintended consequences (water and air pollution, antibiotic resistance, inhumane treatment of animals, inadequately compensated farmworkers, soil erosion on a massive scale, etc.) is the same as that which has produced and perpetuated systemic racism. I don't think it's a stretch to think that teaching the current Tillman kids to care about nature, and to unlearn the "otherness" of nature, will transfer to other areas of life. Our culture is so steeped in otherness, defined as separation coupled with domination, that anything we can do to counterract that narrative will be beneficial. Would it be better if we could also partner with a school district in, say, North St. Louis county to help kids learn that just as we are connected and interdependent with nature, we are connected and interdependent with folks in St. Louis despite our de facto segregation? Yep, but we don't have the foundation set for that yet. What we will have with IGNITE immediately, is a space to directly engage with nature and learn that we are a part of natural systems, interdependent rather than here to subdue nature. And we will have a space that will encourage conversations about our interconnectedness with other people and other places as well---i.e. food systems and watersheds are great jumping off points for that.

And finally, I think it's shameful to keep kids indoors all day, every day except for a 20-minute recess. Kids need to be outside. And IGNITE will be a space that makes teachers want to take kids outside. And that will be awesome.