My field team delivered environmental education presentations to over 750 children in the province of El Oro, working in small groups. Focusing largely on high school-level engagement, we worked at schools in seven towns and cities, from the tiny town of Palo Solo to the large city of Machala.
Our central theme were the multidimensional values of biodiversity-- its inherent value, its value in terms of ecosystem services, in terms of economic value, in terms of medicine and biotechnology, and in terms of beauty and human well-being. More specifically, we also focused on the subject of our scientific field work: the endangered El Oro Parakeet, the particular threats it faces, and the purpose of the ecological corridor that we are working to design.
Poaching for the pet trade is a major threat for this species, so field team member Danielle Ferraro created a comic-style educational poster. We made canvas prints of this art, and worked with school administration to hang them in as many local school courtyards as possible.
Finally, we left a gift for the high school in Piñas, the town situated in the core of our study landscape. I set up a design competition where the students collaboratively generated ideas and individually submitted their proposals, and then the students all voted on their favorite peer design. In the evenings, when the high school was empty, we worked to elaborate this winning design as a large, courtyard mural! The completed mural is pictured below, and the mural contest submission (and its artist) upon which it was based is pictured at the end of the sliding images above.
