E3 Washington Showcase News Articles (Newest to Oldest)
The E2E Regional Initiative kicks off in Seattle WA
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- E3 Washington is Transforming - Please Contribute and Leverage Change in 2014
- Port Townsend High Schools Students for Sustainability
- Educator to Educator: Progressing Partnerships - REGISTRATION CLOSED
- Global Sustainability Education Week
- E3 Washington Regional Leadership Communities of Practice Study Conducted
- Nominations for E3 Washington Board of Directors Now Open - Deadline September 1 st
The E2E Regional Initiative kicks off in Seattle WA 
“The way the meetings were run, with the introduction of the different topics, was way outside my normal experience or way of thinking of working on issues. It was nice to have my horizons expanded.” “I can see the possibilities of where to begin in our state and how we should proceed.” – E2E Regional Participants From December 9th to December 11th, 2013, representatives from Alaska, Idaho, Oregon, and Washington met at the McKinstry Innovation Center in Seattle WA to kick off the Educator to Educator Initiative for Student Learning: A Pacific Northwest Model for Collective Impact (aka, E2E Regional Initiative). The goal of E2E Regional is to develop, implement, evaluate, and disseminate a replicable model for classroom-to-community-and-back environmental education / environmental and sustainability education (EE/ESE) in the Pacific Northwest through a systemic, coordinated approach. The developing E2E regional model is informed by each state's powerful practices for leveraging environmental and sustainability literacy plan implementation, and reinforced by evaluation and systems thinking support from experts in the field. During the E2E Regional kickoff event, participants reflected that it was a “transformational” gathering. After presentations from leading experts on diverse topics such as Cultural Responsiveness, Systems Thinking, Evaluation, and Collective Impact, the teams went to work, co-generating the first stages of a scalable, replicable interstate ESE model that will serve each local community’s diverse needs and stay aligned across the states. One participant reflected that, “our state now has a place to start. We see where we can have impact on our state environmental literacy plan.” The E2E Regional project integrates with the E2E Local initiative and the ongoing E2E Workshop series; two other facets of the Educator 2 Educator approach informed by E3 Washington’s statewide “Get Together” goal. The E2E Local initiative, also titled “Leveraging Sustainability and Systems Education, supports six Washington State school districts to each convene a Leadership Community of Practice (LCoP) to focus on implementing one or more strategies in the Washington State Environmental and Sustainability Literacy Plan (WSESLP) and tackle a “persistent problem of practice.” Representatives from the E2E Local project serve as members of the Washington team in the E2E Regional initiative. E2E Regional representatives joined via distance technology an “Educator 2 Educator: Progressing Partnerships” workshop held on November 1st at South Seattle Community College. This professional development gathering was built around reinforcing powerful practices for community and formal education partnerships that increase student learning across communities in Washington State. At the E2E Workshop on November 1st, Katie Remine with the Woodland Park Zoo commented, “Educator 2 Educator provided a rare opportunity to bring informal and formal educators together to dig deeper into partnerships that support rich learning. The ideas presented in the case studies led to good discussions in the afternoon.” The E2E Regional cohort has since returned to their local communities and begun the work of engaging with their local partners. The E2E Regional cohort as a whole will continue to meet quarterly throughout the two-year initiative. In addition to developing a replicable, scalable model for classroom-to-community-and-back ESE activity in the Pacific Northwest, the E2E Regional initiative will also result in multiple case studies and increased leadership capacity that will help fully infuse high quality EE/ESE into local and statewide curricula for the 21st century, such as interdisciplinary (including Science Technology Engineering & Math (STEM)) and applied learning, and career development. The Educator-to-Educator Initiative including the regional, local, and workshop elements has been made possible through funding from the USEPA and The Boeing Company and The Russell Family Foundation. For more information, contact the E3 Washington office at 360-943-6643 or e3info@e3washington.org.
Dear Friends and Colleagues: During 2013, we collectively "moved the dial" on the five E3 Washington goals; themselves the networked path to having environmental, sustainability and systems learning become the norm in classrooms and communities across our state (see various reports of activities in Showcase News archives). The only organization up to this job is E3 Washington! Behind the scenes, the E3 Washington board and staff made some big structural changes in order to be even more mission-driven and achieve our goals sooner. Early in 2014, we will unveil our five year campaign called "Five-for-Five" (a year-by-year focus on each of the E3 goals over the course of five years). Until then, we hope you will consider us in your end-of-2013 contributions to non-profits. We thank you in advance for being part of our community of change! Photo caption: Staff and Board of E3 Washington from left to right front row: Aaron Zimmer, Erika Holmes, Justine Asohmbom, Gilda Wheeler, Mike Maryanski, Derek Hoshika, Mystique Hurtado from left to right, middle row: Laura Tyler, Effenus Henderson, Tom Hulst, Paul Newton, Stephen Streufert from left to right, back row: Marta Zualaga, Pam Tufts, Ayana Cleveland, Abby Ruskey
In June 2013, Ewan Shortess was one of the student recipients of the E3 Washington Green Apple Award as an Environmental Leader. He has continued to demonstrate outstanding leadership as president of Port Townsend High School’s Students for Sustainability (SFS). Last week Ewan and the SFS club were highlighted in the Port Townsend Leader newspaper for setting its sights on presenting climate change concerns to Congress in Washington D.C.. “We are planning a trip to Washington, D.C., to speak with members of Congress about a carbon tax, fracking and ocean acidification,” Shortess said. “Along the way, we'll stop in 55 communities and speak at other high schools to gain support and build momentum for our message.” Members of the Students for Sustainability will be embarking on this cross-country trip during their upcoming 2014 Spring Break. Additionally, the SFS club has been involved with various causes on and off campus. Recently, SFS has secured recycle bins for every classroom and common room, and now hoping to replace the high school’s disposable lunch trays, plates, and utensils with reusable ones. Throughout the community, SFS is planning on planting more than 500 native tree species to off-set their carbon footprint and is now partnering with Northwest Watershed Institute to hold a yearly Plant-a-Thon. The goal is to spread the message about living sustainable and get students, families, and communities involved. E3 Washington congratulates Ewan and his peers for their continued leadership in learning for sustainability. To read the full article from the Port Townsend Leader, http://www.ptleader.com/news/education/rally-on-the-rails-port-townsend-high-school-students-to/article_98a9a812-6775-11e3-be9a-001a4bcf6878.html. To view the E3 Washington Green Apple Award Winners http://www.e3washington.org/showcase/item.html?id=170.
Educator 2 Educator Central Sound Conference Open for Registration E3 Washington partnering with the Washington Department of Ecology and the Pacific Education Institute are hosting a conference in Seattle NOVEMBER 1. REGISTER NOW!! Bring a team of formal and informal educators to learn and plan how to work throughout the school year! Come to help partnerships grow, find new partnerships and create plans to sustain teamwork. While being held in Central Puget Sound, all are welcome from across the region and state. Registration is open until OCTOBER 22. Educator 2 Educator is a one-day conference providing formal* and informal** educator teams to work effectively together to enhance student subject area learning and their life and job preparation. This is a great opportunity for formal and informal educators to:
Clock Hours Available for this professional development opportunity. *teachers, administrators, curriculum supervisors, superintendents, etc. **community based environmental learning centers, zoos, aquariums, museums, tribes, business etc. REGISTRATION REGISTER NOW!! Team Registration is possible in two ways 1) Team members register and pay individually 2) One organization hosts & pays for all/some team members
$40 + additional team member/s $30 each Sm* Non Profit Sponsorship $60 Sm* Non Profit Sponsorship + 1 free participant $90 Lrg** Non Profit, Agency, Business, Tribal Sponsorship $125 Lrg** Non Profit, Agency, Business, Tribal Sponsorship + 1 free participant $155 *non profits with annual budget under $100,000 **non profits with annual budget over $100,000 (Note: If this fee is an obstacle to attend, please inquire about scholarships, see contact below.) DESIGN TEAM Everett School District Islandwood NatureBridge Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction Padilla Bay National Esturine Reserve Puget Sound Educational Service District 114 Puget Sound Partnership Seattle Aquarium Service Adventure Education Tahoma School District Woodland Park Zoo and others....
Registration Questions or Problems? Contact Ayana Cleveland acleveland@e3washington.org or (360) 943-6643. Program Questions? Contact Event Coordinator: Lisa Eschenbach - eschenbach.lisa@gmail.com or (206)-947-6194
Earlier this year, Governor Jay Inslee issued a proclamation acknowledging the pressing need for sustainable education and his support for educators nationwide. As a result of his proclamation, Global Sustainability Education Week was launched September 22nd – 28th. Governor Inslee’s proclamation was announced in an effort towards creating “flourishing societies, thriving economies, and healthy environments…” as “…local, national and global…educators and students … apply systems thinking, critical thinking, communication, creativity and collaboration across disciplines…” E3 thanks longtime supporter, Facing the Future, for initiating and drafting the proclamation, and appreciates all stakeholders for their tireless efforts in support of teachers and students in the goal of building a more just, healthy, and prosperous Washington State. This week celebrated the Global Sustainability Education (GSE) framework created by Facing the Future, along with other similar efforts to propel environmental, sustainability, and systems education to the next level. During this celebratory week, the Office of the Superintendent of Public Instruction (OSPI) celebrated the US Department of Education: Green Ribbon Schools awards, during the inspiring “Education Built to Last: Washington State Tour and Listening Session” on September 19th. The US Department of Education toured nationwide, celebrating schools which qualified as Green Ribbon Schools through their curriculum and management practices. Several leaders recognized the leading efforts of Washington State at the Listening Session among which were Superintendent Randy Dorn of OSPI, Vice President Ash Awad of McKinstry, Legislator Jake Fey, Andrea Falken from US Department of Education, and Margo Young of the US Environmental Protection Agency. Each speaker emphasized their admiration of Washington State’s environmental and sustainability education as well as sustainable business practices. Superintendent Randy Dorn explained that there are many “cylinders of excellence” statewide currently applying sustainability education to student learning. He shares the vision of Gilda Wheeler, OSPI’s Program Supervisor for Sustainability and Science; that all schools in Washington State will qualify to be Green Ribbon Schools in the near future. Andrea Falken noted that Green Ribbon Schools are “not necessarily highly resourced schools, but highly resourceful schools” inspiring other schools to maximize their resources available and to creatively seek new opportunities. After the motivating presentations, a panel of the Green Ribbon Schools spoke on their journey towards sustainability. Representatives from Camelot Elementary, Kent School District, The Secondary Academy for Success, Sacajawea Elementary, Tahoma School District, and the Evergreen School described their efforts to create an integrated culture of environmental, sustainability, and systems education, highlighting the triumphs and struggles faced in the journey. To demonstrate the lasting effects of sustainability education in the work force, the panel also included Ash Awad, McKinstry’s Vice President of Energy and Facility Solutions who described the benefits in business to hire students who have had sustainability and systems education in K-12. These monumental strides in the sustainable education field help Washington State continue to lead nationally in education, and in pursuing a sustainable future. Strides such as Global Sustainability Education Week and the Green Ribbon School Program help fulfill two of E3 Washington’s five core goals for building a system of education for sustainable communities. One of these goals is “Go Out” which seeks to “help everybody explore and discover their place within the natural and social communities that sustain us”. The other goal, “Lead Green”, centers on “turn[ing] schools, campuses, businesses and public places into models of sustainability”. By collectively addressing all five E3 goals, we together help create a more sustainable future for all peoples in Washington State. District Sustainability:
Green Ribbon Schools:
In today’s busy world where people have less time and more limited resources, why do individuals commit to the long term, vision-based work of an initiative like E3 Washington? To explore this question and to suggest strategies to increase and sustain engagement and success over time in E3 Washington’s Regional Leadership Community of Practice (RLCoP), E3 Network Coordinator Aaron Zimmer, a recent Evergreen State College graduate, made his thesis an examination of the components of engagement in environmental and sustainability education (ESE) activity among a sample of ten leaders within E3 Washington’s larger regional leadership network. E3 Washington’s vision and five compelling goals are inspiring and driving changes in schools, colleges and communities throughout Washington State. However, sustained implementation of E3 Washington goals and strategies requires the combined capacity of multiple aligned sectors, regions, and special initiatives or communities (green schools programs, evaluation and research, etc.). E3 Washington is working to foster and facilitate cross-regional and sector implementation of the E3 Washington goals and is seeking to learn why participants “come to and stay at the table” (i.e., to enhance their efforts to protect nature, improve learning outcomes for students, to build community, or because of agency mandate). This study uncovered some of the shared reasons for initial and sustained engagement among regional E3 Washington leaders, members of what E3 Washington terms a Regional Leadership Community of Practice (RLCoP) According to Wegner and Snyder (2000), Communities of Practice (CoPs), are “individuals informally bound together by shared expertise and passion for a joint enterprise [1]”. CoPs leverage the communication, resource-sharing, and relationship-building aspects of partnerships in order to engage the diverse individuals and communities necessary to achieve sustained collective gains. The findings of the study are promising. The E3 regional leaders who were interviewed were professionally, culturally, and geographically diverse. All participants were dedicated to ESE but their roles varied, from superintendents, to teachers, to informal educators, to private entrepreneurs and business leaders. There were many reasons why each person felt engaged in their varying ESE capacity building experiences, but all study participants expressed four key interlinking elements that sustained their ESE engagement:
Not all participants shared the same priority ordering of these ideas. For some, an unexpected paradigm shift was a key engaging element, while others felt a pre-existing responsibility to their ESE-related cause, and so on. Regardless, the above elements were shared as a connected story by all respondents, and paint a picture of the underlying process of engagement in their respective ESE activities. With this picture informing next steps, E3 Washington will apply what has been learned here and through other outreach, for engaging the regional leadership in the months and years ahead. Key recommendations from this study are for E3 Washington to: a) Continue to convene and facilitate regional teams’ co-discovery of relevant goal(s) and strategies (i.e., regional resource sharing, linking student learning and community-based learning resources, year-round teacher and informal educator professional development, etc.); b) Focus on fostering the four major findings of the research listed above as a point of departure for group activity (i.e., during relationship building, implementation of regional goals and strategies, etc) c) Provide systems thinking and other tools to encourage continual co-discovery as the team progresses, and as relationships and new regional goals and strategies emerge organically over time. What are additional lessons we can learn from this study? First, facilitating groups for a common purpose and collective impact is not a cookie-cutter exercise. We must take the time to know the group’s needs and underlying connective story. Second, we must find the greatest common links and foster those elements in the group’s program, then assist the group to grow organically from those points of departure. For E3 Washington, these guidelines will help the continued effort to build a successful and resilient Regional Leadership Community of Practice to both enhance the lives of those involved and to achieve the E3 Washington goals. For more information contact E3 Network Coordinator, Aaron Zimmer, at azimmer@e3washington.org or E3 Washington Executive Director, Abby Ruskey at aruskey@e3washington.org
E3 Washington strives to serve the people of Washington State by providing a non-centralized network where business, educators, scientists, students and others can openly exchange ideas and resources about sustainability and systems thinking. YOU now have the chance to nominate yourself or others as candidates to serve on the E3 Washington Board of Directors for the 2014-2016 term! Nomination Deadline: September 1st 2013 (https://catalyst.uw.edu/webq/survey/ptufts/204931). Seeking for culturally and regionally diverse people from across Washington in these 5 categories: 1) Expertise: systems thinking/dynamics, business management, legal, government affairs, accounting, health, marketing/social media, organizational and leadership development, research and evaluation; 2) Formal Education/learning: Office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, K-12 school administrators, education association leaders, community college & universities/colleges faculty, students & administrators; 3) Corporate executives and personnel: from sustainable design, banking, aerospace, outdoor/recreational products, forestry, farming/agriculture, architectural, engineering, energy, clean tech and high tech industries, tourism and other industries; 4) Informal Education & National/Regional/Community-Based Entities: environmental and conservation organizations, public health, nature centers; 5) Tribal and environmental justice: tribal leaders in additional to those working with specific ethnic groups or populations that are under-represented in society as a whole and have less access to high quality environmental and sustainability education opportunities.
2) Send them a) a personalized email that includes a) a link to the E3 Washington website (www.e3washington.org), b) E3 flyer (see link below), c) overview of responsibilities (see link below). 3) Then, either you, or they fill out the online application form, (due September 1) which includes a brief statement about why they would like to be on the board. 4) Applications will be reviewed by the E3 Washington Nominations Committee in September, and up to 7 people will be placed on this year’s slate of recommendations pending the approval of the full E3 Washington Board of Directors. Please note, in the interest of diverse skills and categories, some candidates may be held over till next year, when we will be likely expanding the board. 5) A ballot with the slate will be sent to the dues paying members of E3 Washington in October who will have the opportunity to vote up or down for the slate as a whole. 6) All applicants will be notified by mid-November of the results of the process. There will be a board training meeting for all new members early December, and members will take office January 2014. Questions? Feel free to contact the E3 Nominating Committee Pam Tufts, Chair ptufts@uw.edu Or Abby Ruskey, Executive Director at aruskey@e3washignton.org or 360-943-6643 Thank you for helping us find the next set of exemplary board members to achieve the E3 Washington mission and vision. We look forward to interviewing those who you feel will help us better serve YOU!
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