This website is the digital home of the ESE-TE Standing Committee of the Canadian Network for Environmental Education and Communication,(EECOM). The ESE-TE Committee is dedicated to advancing and supporting the development of high quality Environmental & Sustainability Education (ESE) in Teacher Education (TE) in Canada through research, policy, and professional development.
The ESE-TE Standing Committee is working in four strategic directions: raising awareness of ESE-TE; deepening knowledge and understanding about ESE-TE; developing supports and resources for ESE-TE; and recommending policy in ESE-TE. These directions aim to engage those involved in teacher education to better support a cultural shift of Canadians towards more sustainable forms of living. This is a work in progress, and viewers are invited to send in resources, research, and other information to make it stronger repository of work in this field.
About Environmental & Sustainability Education
This project has purposefully chosen the term ‘Environmental and Sustainability Education’ (ESE) as a way to reference the multiple traditions of environmental learning that happen at all levels of education: environmental education; education for sustainable development; Indigenous education; Land-based learning; nature-based learning; outdoor & experiential education; place-based education, eco-justice education; éducation relative à l’environnement et au développement durable; education for sustainability; humane education; and sustainability for wellbeing. This signals a desire to honour the contributions of the multiple theoretical positions and voices that inform ESE in teacher education in this critical work.
ESE-TE Standing Committee of EECOM
Andrejs Kulnieks, Co-Chair
Asst. Professor, Faculty of Education, University of Saskatchewan
Andrejs teaches in the area of English Language Arts, Literacies, and Drama education. His research spans the fields of curriculum theory, language and literacy, arts-informed research, poetic inquiry, Indigenous environmental studies, and leadership in eco-justice environmental education.
Joshua Hill, Co-Chair
Assistant Professor, Department of Education, Mount Royal University
Through his teaching, service, and scholarship Josh seeks to create the conditions to (re)story education as a journey towards agency, wonder, and expansive awareness of oneself-in-the-world. He is currently exploring storytelling, Indigenous land based learning, and heterarchy in the contexts of learning, teaching, and leadership in k-12 and post secondary education.
Alisa Paul, Secretary
Alisa Paul is working on her PhD in Learning Environments and is the cohort coordinator for the Sustainability cohort in teacher education at UBC. She completed her M.Ed in 2019 at SFU in Ecological Education and worked in teacher education at SFU, primarily with the SEEDS and French Modules. Her passion for community building and resiliency form part of her personal pedagogy. Learning is relational and Alisa center’s her approach on connecting students to their local places and acknowledging the systems that they are engaged in.
Marie Tremblay, Treasurer
Educational Consultant
Marie’s professional experience includes over a decade of teaching in elementary schools and in universities, including five years in Indigenous communities of Canada’s far north. She was an active member of Alberta’s environmental community for over two decades as a graduate student, conservation scientist, and senior manager in the public and non-profit sectors.
Nicole Bell
Assoc. Professor, School of Education & Professional Learning, Trent University
Nicole’s research areas include Indigenous culture-based education, infusion of Indigenous knowledge into public schooling and teacher education, decolonization and healing, and Indigenous research theory and methodology. She is Anishnaabe (Bear Clan) from Kitigan Zibi First Nation in Quebec, the mother of five boys, and is passionate about Indigenous education, motivated by her educational experiences personally and as a mother.
Maurice DiGiuseppe
Professor (retired), Faculty of Education, University of Ontario Institute of Technology
Maurice’s research focuses on teacher professional development, environmental education, school gardens, scientific inquiry, and the development of digital learning resources in secondary and post-secondary education. Maurice has authored and/or collaborated in the development of a number of science and environmental science textbooks and learning resources.
Ellen Field
Assistant Professor, Lakehead University
Ellen’s research interests are in policy and practice of climate change education in the Canadian K-12 system. She is an Associate Editor of the Canadian Journal of Environmental Education, co-chair of the Canadian Regional Hub of MECCE, and co-lead of the Accelerating Climate Change Ed in Teacher Education national project.
Patrick Howard
Professor of Education, Cape Breton University
Patrick developed his interest in the intersections between issues of sustainability and education during a twenty plus-year career teaching high school in coastal communities on the island of Newfoundland, Canada. Patrick’s research and writing have been dedicated to exploring how our defining human abilities, creativity, language and imagination, as products of nature, are mediums by which we may grow in our relationships with the living places we inhabit.
Hilary Inwood
Coordinator, Sustainability & Climate Action Network, Ontario Institute for Studies in Education, University of Toronto
Hilary leads OISE’s Sustainability & Climate Action Network, and teaches courses in its Master of Teaching program. Her research focuses on the professional development of preservice and inservice teachers in relation to ESE, and on arts-based approaches to developing environmental literacy. She is co-lead of the Accelerating Climate Change Ed in Teacher Education national project.
Doug Karrow
Assoc. Professor, Faculty of Education, Brock University
Douglas specializes in science and environmental education; in addition to teaching pre-service and graduate education courses, his research interests centre on school-based environmental education, place-based education, ontological education, and ecophenomenology.
Patrick Robertson
Doctoral Candidate, Faculty of Education, University of British Columbia
Patrick currently co-leads the Education for Sustainability teacher education cohort in the Faculty of Education at the University of British Columbia. He also leads Syncollab Strategies, a consulting collaborative in B.C., is the current Chair of the Classrooms to Communities (C2C) Education Network, and serves as a director or advisor for various other organizations focused on sustainability, climate, teacher education, literacy, and educational transformation.
Laura Sims (Liaison & Board Member, EECOM)
Professor, Faculty of Education, Université de Saint-Boniface
Laura teaches in the faculty of education at the Université de Saint-Boniface, Winnipeg. Laura’s research specializes in education-for-sustainability and learning in formal (i.e. faculties of education) and non-formal learning contexts (i.e. small scale farmers in Latin America). She currently researches learning and peace building in Colombia. Previously, she taught high school and managed a Central American CIDA project.
Rob VanWynsberghe
Assoc. Professor, Dept. of Educational Studies, UBC
Rob has a PhD in Sociology, and his research expertise is in sustainability and the related areas of social movements and capacity building.
Carine Villemagne
Professor, Faculty of Education, Université de Sherbrooke
Carine’s research focuses on adults’ learning in environmental education, generally working with adults who have lower levels of education. She is a researcher associated with the Center for Research in Environmental Education and Training (Centr’ERE) that is located at the Université du Québec à Montréal.
Alysse Kennedy
ESE-TE Standing Committee Administrator Currently on parental leave
Alysse has a PhD in Curriculum and Pedagogy and focuses on making environmental and sustainability education and climate action relevant, meaningful and accessible. She is currently the Publishing Manager at the Outdoor Learning School & Store and teaches in the Master of Arts in Child Study and Education program at OISE.
Caitlin Hastings
ESE-TE Standing Committee Interim Administrator
Caitlin Hastings is a Master of Education – Social Justice Specialization graduate from Lakehead University and has an Honours Bachelor of Community Safety degree from Sheridan College. Caitlin’s primary goals are to continue working in social and environmental justice education/research aimed at building community awareness and empowering future generations for equitable social change.
Sponsors
We are deeply appreciative of the funders who have supported this work.
