Conventional education, at all levels, largely ignores the broad context and specific skills that define an emerging reliable prosperity. Fragmented by discipline and disconnected with place, it leaves people ill prepared to direct the enormous transitions that are occurring.
A student from Open Meadow School, participating in the Crew for Restoring the Urban Environment (CRUE), takes a water sample.
Reliable Prosperity depends on the Access to knowledge of its citizens. This includes both access to basic literacy skills, math and science, history, geography, and so forth and a new kind of ecological literacy grounded in the core knowledge areas of reliable prosperity. Access to knowledge must be universal, and available to all ages.
Ecological literacy requires a broad familiarity with the functioning of the biosphere and the distribution of cultures and ecosystems across its land and waters. It entails a more detailed knowledge of the local bioregion and its flora, fauna, rivers and mountains, forests and fields, soils, geology, climate, and history. It demands an even more intimate knowledge of the immediate region, its mingled cultural and natural history, its economic activities, patterns of settlement, its elders and its storytellers. It is sensitive to local and cultural traditions, and ways of knowing.
Ecological literacy extends from Ecosystem Services to Green Building, from True Cost Pricing to Agriculture. It provides the conceptual tools to map and invest in social, natural, and economic capital. It includes the practical tools to participate in Civic Society, along with skills like placing erosion control structures on a riverbank or tending a salmon hatchbox. The schools, centers, and universities that teach ecological literacy are a critical resource, and educational activities should be designed to give back to the community.
While ecological literacy is best instilled in the very young, it continues to be refined through high school, university, and work experience, and is fundamentally intergenerational in character. It can be transmitted through environmental curricula within traditional educational institutions; broadcasted through a wide range of Sense of Place; incorporated within green marketing campaigns; passed on by skilled mentors; and continually renewed through festivals, celebrations, and rituals.
Ecological literacy creates opportunities for new products and services by facilitating greater understanding of local ecosystems and broader living processes. It celebrates and nurtures knowledge of place as a critical resource for sound stewardship. It encourages a base of shared knowledge that is widely distributed among the inhabitants of a bioregion, and emphasizes community access to data of local relevance. For these reasons, Access to Knowledge is a critical supporting element of Local Economies. It is the irreplaceable intellectual capital that pervades reliable prosperity from the smallest village to the largest city, providing both new economic opportunities and renewed ties to place and biosphere.
At all educational levels, provide a fully-integrated ecological literacy curriculum which grounds students in the science of living systems and the practical skills necessary to create reliable prosperity. Place particular emphasis on local and bioregional topics, and carefully connect educational institutions with their surrounding communities. Ensure that access to knowledge is universal, and available to all ages.