Project Duration

2018-2024

Background

How can citizen science facilitate environmental education, and what does current research tell us about this relationship? Our Center hoped to answer these questions through participation in eeWorks, a broader initiative led by the North American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE). Research groups such as ours conducted systematic literature reviews on various environmental education topics. At CCCS, we investigated and synthesized the research evidence available documenting citizen science as a pathway for environmental education. Additionally, we hoped to identify future research directions to best support community and citizen science (CCS) as a strategy for environmental education, and proposed a research agenda based on our findings.

With these goals in mind, we asked the following research questions in our larger study:

• What are the key ways in which CCS and environmental education are aligned theoretically?
• What common environmental and educational outcomes have been measured within the context of CCS?
• What are the recommendations for design and implementation of CCS for environmental education (or vice versa)?
• What are the identified directions for future research?

To learn more about our research methods and preliminary findings view our poster from CitSci 2019.

Funder

North American Association of Environmental Education