Sustainability for the Children: Enviornmental Education with F2F in the Dominican Republic
Fondo Agua Yaque del Norte (Fondo Agua) and APEDI are two prominent environmental conservation organizations in the Dominican Republic. Fondo Agua uses financial mechanisms to raise capital managed as a trust to fund environmental conservation and recovery in the Yaque del Norte river basin. APEDI is a leading Dominican non-profit that promotes economic and social development in the country. The two organizations have formed a partnership to promote sustainable development outcomes in the country.
Noticing the lack of formal environmental education, the organizations decided to create an environmental education manual focused on natural resource management for universities, schools, and other educational programs. To accelerate the creation process, the organizations requested the support of Farmer-to-Farmer volunteers to guide the organizations’ staff on topics and content for the manual.
Due to travel restrictions during the COVID-19 pandemic, F2F DR recruited a local and a remote volunteer team to assist in creating the manual. The remote volunteer, Peter Philips, is a retired professor of marine and aquatic resources with significant expertise in teaching natural resource management in English and Spanish. The local volunteer, Rashel Santana, is a publication and writing specialist in the Dominican Republic who helped tailor Dr. Philip’s content to the country’s environmental and educational context.
The assignment started with virtual meetings between the two volunteers and organization staff to listen and respond to hosts and volunteers’ questions, review the itinerary, contextualize the problem for Peter, and establish the next steps. After, Rashel began in-person meetings with the organizations’ staff to outline the manual, work through content details, and gather questions to bring to Peter. After months of collaboration between Rashel, Peter, APEDI, and Fondo Agua, the organizations now have a comprehensive manual to guide environmental and natural resource-based education in the Dominican Republic. The manual has a series of modules for each topic, and it may be taught in-person or remotely.
With this manual, the country has a powerful and comprehensive tool that can be disseminated throughout the Dominican Republic’s educational and civil society organizations. After the assignment, F2F DR and the participating organizations hosted an online launch party to celebrate the finalization and deployment of the manual. F2F DR anticipates further collaboration with these organizations to implement and update the manual moving forward.
This assignment contributed to the broader goals and objectives of the Rural Adaptation and Resilience by creating educational tools to enhance natural resource management in the Dominican Republic.
Rashel, Peter, F2F Field Officer Rafael Marte, and the director of APEDI discussing the manual virtually
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