Kaleidoscope 2001:
Multiple Windows on Global Environmental Issues.

An Internet-based Collaboration for Middle School Students
in Charleston, South Carolina and Umea, Sweden

 "Global learning" is an educational movement popularized over the past ten
years to teach children that each of us holds multiple citizenships and
needs to know something about the world-wide community to which we belong.
The environment is an important facet of that larger community, and
educators recognize the need to have their students examine environmental
and health-related issues on a global scale.  But to date, relatively few
public schools, particularly those with low-income and minority student
populations in parts of the Southeast, have been able to muster the
resources needed to add this important dimension to their students'
educational experience.

The purpose of this project is to bring students from different parts of
the world together via internet discussion, video teleconferencing, and
(eventually) short-term exchange of students and teachers to examine and
discuss selected environmental issues of global, as well as local,
significance.  Topics will include global climate change, children's
environmental health risks, environmental equity, and careers in
environmental management and policy.

A pilot project to demonstrate the feasibility of this approach will link
two public schools, one in Charleston County, South Carolina, and one in
Umea, Sweden.  Both communities have regionally important universities with
strong environmental health programs from which to draw expertise: the
Environmental Biosciences Program (EBP) at the Medical University of South
Carolina (MUSC) in Charleston and the Department of Environmental Health at
the University of Umea.  Both communities have a strong public school
system dedicated to serving the needs of  a varied student body, including
minority and low-income populations.  These communities also share a
coastal environmental heritage.  Being located, respectively, on the
Atlantic Ocean and the Baltic Sea, they are poised to deal with the
potential effects of global climate change and sea-level rise over the next
twenty-five years.  However, they differ radically in climate and culture
since Umea is nearly arctic and snow covered for many months, while
Charleston is subtropical and rarely experiences freezing weather.

A collaboration between schools in Charleston and Umea will afford students
the opportunity to better understand the broad implications of contemporary
environmental concerns and to see them through the lens of culturally
diverse points of view.  Students will examine national policy on
environmental issues and compare how other nations handle the same issues.
They will interact with students their own age in another country to learn
how those students react to environmental problems of global scope.  They
will collect environmental data and/or conduct an educational survey in
their own country and share the results with collaborating students in
another country.

This collaboration has several advantages as a pilot project.  First, both
schools are public middle schools for students aged approximately 12
through 15.  This is the age when students begin to think seriously about
education for the workplace and many may consider environmental careers.
Unlike high school students, they have few options for international
exchange.  Second, language poses no barrier.  Instruction will take place
in English since the Swedish students participate in an English language
immersion program in science and social studies classes.  Third, a
university partnership is being established to sustain contact between the
two school districts on topics of relevance to environmental health.  Dr.
Lillian Trettin, a faculty member in the EBP at MUSC who recently lived in
Umea for half a year, will facilitate connections between the two schools,
procure and disseminate resource materials, and  assist participating
teachers and students throughout the program.  This exchange, a pilot
project scheduled to run for two to three years, will then serve as a model
for other partnerships which could vary in the number of participants and
in the selection of states or countries involved.


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Lillian D. Trettin, Ph.D.
712 Wakendaw Blvd.
Mt. Pleasant, SC 29464
ph: 843-884-3866
email: ltrettin@awod.com
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