Wanted! Volunteers for EENC’s 2020 Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Action Team

If you work in environmental education, you know EE is just as important for your participants as it is for the planet. You probably also know that if EE is not accessible to everyone, the potential impact is limited. You may even be the person in your workplace making the case for equity in EE. We’re right there with you. In November 2019, EENC board members participated in an Equity Engagement Strategy Planning session with the Center for Diversity and the Environment. From that 3-day meeting, we’ve developed a multi-year plan that complements our strategic plan to make our organization and the field of environmental education more equitable and inclusive.

EENC is focusing the first year of our plan on information gathering and internal examination with a 2020 action team. The plan is to

1. Assemble a team! You do NOT have to be available the entire year to be a part of this. If only a couple of projects or timelines work for you, we’d still love to have your voice.

2. Pick a standing bi-weekly call time. In between calls, the team will work through email and shared documents.

3. Work together through the year to complete these projects:

   • Prioritize which dimensions of diversity are important for EENC to track. (March)

   • Craft a more inclusive communications plan for conferences/events, including recruitment, reminders/updates, day-of communications, and follow up. (April)

   • Update EENC’s diversity statement. (May)

   • Research best practices for inclusive convenings. Rank recommendations for EENC implementation. (June)

   • Generate a “potential partners” list for other groups/orgs doing diversity, equity, and inclusion and environmental justice work in NC. (July)

   • Research best practices and create doc/policy to govern organizational behavior. (August)

   • Solicit feedback from members/participants about what kinds of training/resources they need to be more aware and prepared to work with diverse audiences. (September)

   • Review EENC’s internal systems for potential exclusion of individuals (ex: registration, scholarship/mini-grant applications and review). (October)

   • Compare how we publicly define environmental education/what it means to be an environmental educator, and how others define it. (November)

4. Share progress with our members, partners, and professional community.

If you are passionate about addressing diversity, equity, and inclusion within environmental education, we want to hear from you! If you have a recommendation for someone outside our field to engage, please share that connection. Or if you can’t commit to this team, but you have recommendations or feedback you want to share about any of these projects, please let us know.