WORKING DRAFT

Educating Democratic-Ecological Citizens for the 21st Century

By Julian L. Wong and Kevin F. Hsu

First Draft December 31, 2016

Updated March 5, 2017

I. Introduction

As the social and environmental costs of neoliberal capitalism are laid increasingly bare,1 a
rising tide of proposals calls for radically reforming the political institutions and economic
structures that govern human societies. These inspired efforts to create the next system are
sorely needed, but to be successful, must be accompanied by another crucial step beyond
evolving our institutions.

Radical change requires a constituency to support, propagate, and maintain these measures.
Citizens must be armed with factual knowledge, practical skills, and ethical intuition to embody
transformative new modes of living. Otherwise, the transition will not be easily accepted.
Society could easily revert to the extractive and wealth-hoarding logic of 20th century
capitalism, a force that has proven surprisingly resilient. The most powerful levers of change
require evolving the mindset or paradigm out of which the systemits goals, structure, rules,
delays, parametersarises.2 In short, we must change underlying beliefs, not simply alter
institutional incentives. A fundamental source of our worldviews and reasoning is the formal
education system through which most people experience. Such education systems provide a
prime opportunity for creative rethinking.

Our present educational system churns out workers, not citizens, who uncritically and
unquestioningly uphold the neoliberal economic order. For most, the logic and assumptions of
the capitalist system is baked into their conception of society and their place in it, defining
themselves as consumers with limited agency and choice only over which brands to purchase.
They are directed to pursue certain types of jobs, to celebrate materialistic progress, and to
venerate wealth, in service of a dialectical story of capitalist triumph. Meanwhile, they suffer
from what Richard Louv has termed nature deficit disorder3 because of diminishing
opportunities to engage with the natural world caused by the patterns of modern economic
and technological development and a broader alienation from the democratic process.4

1
Monbiot, George 2016. Neoliberalism the ideology at the root of all our problems, The Guardian, Apr 15,
2016, at https://www.theguardian.com/books/2016/apr/15/neoliberalism-ideology-problem-george-monbiot
2
Meadows, Donella H. 2008. Thinking in Systems A Primer.
3
Louv, Richard 2005, 2008. Last Child in the Woods.
4
See DK 2014, Why young people dont vote, The Economist, at http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-
explains/2014/10/economist-explains-24

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Schools should not simply be vocational training centers; they are an expression of our societys
values. As cornerstones of the democratic tradition, educational institutions set social priorities,
model appropriate behavior, and nurture worldviews. They can transmit our fundamental
sense of care for others in society, not merely equip students for the rat race, and in doing so,
take on a more important function in society as a center of community. Creating a shift in
values requires updating and rethinking this basic building block of modern society.

In this essay, we (i) examine the failure of our modern education system to nurture and equip
citizens to make the right choices for society and our environment, (ii) introduce a new idea for
a comprehensive new pre-k-12 educational curriculum based on the pillars of democratic
citizenship and ecological literacy, (iii) describe the features of such democratic-ecological
curriculum, and (iv) propose an implementation roadmap for the diffusion of democratic-
ecological literacy throughout public schools in the United States and internationally.

II. The Failure of Modern Education

"Education should aim at destroying free will so that after pupils are thus schooled they will be
incapable throughout the rest of their lives of thinking or acting otherwise than as their
schoolmasters would have wished." -- Johann Gottlieb Ficthe, also known as the spiritual father
of Nazism

It is a well-known problem that too many schools today function as soulless factories of despair
where teachers, administrators, and students mechanically enact their assigned scripts and
prescribed roles. Boredom is the elephant in the (class) room. Engaging, vibrant, and
academically rigorous schools seem to be the exception, not the rule.
--Marcelo M. Suarez-Orozco, Carolyn Sattin-Bajaj, and Carola Suarez-Orozco5

Our collective worldview is shaped by an educational system geared towards an industrial

production system

The origins of the American public school system drew inspiration from the Prussian
educational model that prepared obedient workers for factory jobs in the industrializing
economy of the 1800s.6 The methods and mentality behind the factory-model education
system still prevail today, not only in the United States, but in many other parts of the world.
These features include hierarchical, top-down management; separation from the community;
standardization; and a focus on efficiency, i.e. producing results. Unlike the traditions of
classical education, this distorted model disregards ethics and human values, interpersonal
relations (or social etiquette), and understanding of the natural world.

5
Suarez-Orozco, Marcela M., et al. 2010. Introduction: Architecture of Care in Educating the Whole Child for the
Whole WorldThe Ross School Model and Education for the Global Era, Suarez-Orozco, Marcela M. & Sattin-Bajaj.
Carolyn, eds.
6
Rose, Joel 2002. How to Break Free of Our 19th Century Model Education System. The Atlantic,
athttp://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/05/how-to-break-free-of-our-19th-century-factory-model-
education-system/256881/

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Many of these obsessions are reflected in the larger industrial economic system in which
educational institutions operate, often characterized as the neoliberal economic order. With
this logic, large numbers matter, but individuals and communities do not. The present
educational system also breeds overspecialization of work functions, creating artificial
boundaries to delineate content: academic disciplines. Compartmentalization inhibits
learners from solving problems holistically. It blinds them to interconnections and emerging
patterns. This deficiency suited captains of industry, as managers had the vantage point to
connect the dots for themselves, while maintaining dominance and control over the masses, at
the expense of the individual worker.

This industrial-educational system undergirds a political and economic system fundamentally

at odds with our ecological limits

An unquenchable thirst for maximizing profit motivates industrial actors, who are
disconnected from the lifecycles of nature and the long-term social health of communities.
Economic decision-makers focus on short-term business cycles, sacrificing human well-being,
the integrity of communities, and despoil nature, with nary a second thought. Over time, this
mode of production and social organization has been shown to be fundamentally at odds with
social solidarity and ecological health. Our global economic activity is already causing us to
critically approach or exceed four out of nine critical planetary boundaries as defined by the
Stockholm Resilience Institute: atmospheric carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus flows from
agriculture dumped into our river systems, land use changes, and the rate of biodiversity loss.7

In the process, we are compromising the Earths interconnected life support systems, and since
every system is connected to every other system, any one breach of a critical boundary is
enough to shift the entire system into destabilizing collapse. While power may be concentrated
in the hands of a few, overall, societys choices are shaped by a worldview that causes us to
adopt a destructive economic operating system predicated on short-termism and a perpetual
growth model that fails to respect ecological limits.

At the individual level, we are increasingly disconnected from our natural environment and
human communities

Because of a handful of global mega trends, in a few generations, human societies have been
cut off from experiencing the natural environment firsthand. Urbanization has moved people
away from the countryside and agrarian activities, where an intimate understanding of weather
and soil was long crucial to livelihood. Industrialization, ignited by the invention of the steam
engine and internal combustion engine and modern discovery of the processes to refine
petroleum liberated humans from the whims of natural currents such as the direction and

7
Stockholm Resilience Institute. Planetary Boundaries an Update, at
http://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/research-news/2015-01-15-planetary-boundaries---an-update.html,
accessed Feb 26, 2017.

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velocity of the wind and the seasons of the year, and obfuscated the limitations of manual
labor, and together with urbanization, led to profound transformations of our natural
landscapes to this day. Globalization and specialization of commerce have elongated and
subdivided supply chains, so that end-consumers, and even workers working on specific links in
a supply chain, have scant idea of what natural resources their products originate from.
Financialization has created speculative bubbles over esoteric, complex financial instruments
that avoid regulatory oversight and confound the imaginations of lay people, yet are collectively
valued many times more than the real economy, resulting in a monumental misallocation of
capital away from the things that really matter. And finally, digitization has enhanced economic
productivity in an unprecedented way, shrinking the power of mainframe computers to fit in
our pockets, but it has also made us slaves to our virtual personas and digital mobile devices--
often at the expense of real-world connections with nature, community, and even our own
family members. Instant gratification has become the norm.

Taken together, these trends, fueled in no small part by the economic order and underpinned
by a problematic educational system, have created a disconnect between people, nature, and
human communities, resulting in ignorance or indifference about the consequences of our
behavior and actions at all levels. Think about the following dichotomies as examples--
individual rights vs. community responsibilities, mind vs. body, human life vs. non-human life,
fellow citizens vs. immigrants, nationalism vs. globalism and economy vs. ecology, but to name
a few. From individual choices, to business behavior to governments forming international
trade arrangements, the illusion of separation has become culturally prevalent and has resulted
in the multitude of ecological and social crises we now confront.

More recently, studies tell us that humanitys disconnect from the environment is not just
natures loss, but ours as well. The loss of contact with nature not only deprives us of the
necessary understanding of our earth systems to avert ecological tragedy, but also of the
physical, mental and even spiritual well-being that comes with being in the outdoors. We suffer
today from what Richard Louv has called nature deficit syndrome, which among other effects,
include a loss of creativity and increased rates of anxiety and depression.8 As aptly described in
Robert Putnams emblematic essay Bowling Alone, human society is increasingly atomized.
Social solidarity and civic responsibility have diminished as community organizations
increasingly fall by the wayside. Our main expression of connection is through consumption of
consumer goods and popular entertainment, instead of civil society.9

In sum, our modern education system has fallen short in the following ways:
1. Failure to engender compassion and empathy for other members of society and our
ecological environment
2. Failure to preserve and enhance a childs natural sense of wonder about the marvels
and value of life and nature

8
Louv, Richard 2005, 2008. Last Child in the Woods.
9
Putnam, Robert 2000. Bowling Alone.

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3. Failure to appreciate the interconnectedness of systems, especially the connections

between our natural systems and our cultural systems
4. Failure to equip our citizens with the skills to understand and peaceably engage with our
neighbors, local community and global community, including those from different
cultures, religions and ethnicities.

A new kind of education is needed to address these shortcomings. An education based on the
interconnected concepts of democratic citizenship and ecological literacy will give rise to more
responsible, empathetic individuals. As a result, these individuals will value collaboration,
solidarity and sustainability. In both personal and societal decisions, these citizens will be better
informed, ethically-guided, and sensitive to societal, communal and ecological needs, ready for
successful participation in the Next System.

III. Democratic-Ecological Education as a Response

All education is environmental education...by what is included or excluded we teach the young
that they are part of or apart from the natural world.
-- David W. Orr, environmental educator

The current educational paradigm indoctrinates children to serve as subservient workers and
unquestioning backers of an industrial system that violates the limits to ecological sustainability
and disrupts the fabric of human communities. We propose a fundamental rethink of the role,
content and form of education. Education based on the interconnected pillars of democratic
citizenship and ecological literacy will give rise to more responsible, empathetic individuals who
value collaboration, sustainability and solidarity. Whether in their personal, professional, or
public lives, citizens inculcated with this set of diverse ideas will be better-informed, guided by
ethics, and more sensitive to communal and ecological needs. In short, they will be ready for
successful participation in the Next System. In this section, we will further elaborate on the
pillar principles of democratic citizenship and ecological literacy, and then further delve into the
characteristics of a democratic-ecological educational system.

A. Democracy + Ecology = Next System

Since the Enlightenment, political thinkers have discussed the role of education in training
citizens who can participate in reasoned debate and who are committed to a participatory, law-
based means for making collective political decisions. Sociologists Gabriel Almond and Sidney
Verba described how a civic culture is crucial to the success and maintenance of democracy. 10
Education that intones the rights and responsibilities of democratic citizenship and the
fundamental features of a liberal order are key to the development of this civic culture.

Ecological literacy is the ability to understand the natural systems and principles of
organization that make life on earth possible and to understand the principles of organization

10
Almond, Gabriel and Verba, Sidney 1963. The Civic Culture.

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of ecological communities and using those principles for creating sustainable human
communities. Ecological literacy is a powerful concept as it creates a foundation for an
integrated approach to environmental problems. Ecological literacy is distinct from what is
conventionally termed as environmental education. Conventional environmental education, if
ever taught, is often an afterthought and plays a secondary, supporting role to core curricula,
sending the message that it is not as important a subject to be mastered by the educated
citizen. Additionally, environmental educations scope is limited in scope to intellectual content
based on a little bit of science (basic ecology), a little bit of public policy -- it fails to bridge the
gap between this is what you need to know and this is what you need to do and how to do
it. Most glaringly, it contains heavy dose of well-intentioned but ultimately ineffective
suggestions for action that address the symptoms rather than root cause of a larger
problem. Ecological literacy, on the other hand, is grounded on the principles of ecology, not
only as the basis for educational content, but as a mental model for thinking about all spheres
of life and society beyond the biological. Because of its emphasis on interrelationships,
systems, and system dynamics, ecological thinking is the kind of thinking we aspire all our
citizens adopt and make decisions with.

As we hope to show below, there is significant overlap between democratic and ecological
literacies, and in fact, there is strong reason to believe that one reinforces the other. Without
these fundamental literacies, students who become adult citizens will be less likely to design
the correct Next System or uphold Next System ideas; less likely to vote for pro-social
outcomes; and less likely to make good decisions whether as policymakers, community leaders
or entrepreneurs.

B. Features of a Democratic-Ecological Educational Program

What would the curriculum look like? There is no one-size-fits-all curriculum, since the precise
features of ones education should be shaped by local geography, social conditions, history and
culture. What works for one school cannot replicated wholesale in another. Rather, any
model program will need to be migrated and adapted to local context. However, there
are key principles in common that would connect these different educational efforts and
deliver on the promise of democratic-ecology:

Whole Child Development and Multiple Intelligences. In addition to exposure and

competency with specific academic content, an ecologically literate child will achieve
competency in other important areas. Drawing from Howard Gardners framework of
multiple intelligences,11 we identify a set of ten types of intelligences that can serve as
a heuristic for a holistic education: verbal-linguistic, logical-mathematical, bodily-
kinesthetic, musical-rhythmic, visual-spatial, interpersonal, intrapersonal, naturalistic-
ecological, existential-spiritual, and moral. Conventional public educational curricula
focus on the first two, and if resources permit, sometimes cater to third, fourth and
fifth. Rarely, however, are the remaining five intelligences, which lie at the core of
11
See Smith, Mark K. 2002, 2008. Howard Gardner and multiple intelligences, the encyclopedia of informal
education, http://www.infed.org/mobi/howard-gardner-multiple-intelligences-and-education.

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democratic-ecological literacy, explicitly taught, discussed or practiced. A few

additional points are worth considering:
o Under the interpersonal literacy, a democratic-ecological curriculum would
cultivate collaboration, exploration and active learning, rather than solely
individual work, lecture-style teaching and passive learning. In addition to
cultivating skills of conversation, cooperation, listening and empathy,
collaborative project work has also been shown by studies to enhance learning
and retention compared to more conventional lecture-style teaching and
individual assessment.
o Existential-spiritual intelligence is worthy of particular mention. While many
react with unease at the thought of spiritual education at public schools (often
due to the Constitutional doctrine of separating church and state, and the
erroneous conflation of spirituality with religion), there is a growing body of
science on existence of spiritual dimension to child development and growing
evidence of benefits of nurturing spiritual growth amongst kids, including
increased levels of self-confidence, empathy and resilience.12 One can imagine
how these traits, amplified at scale across society, would be socially desirable.
Spiritual intelligence also reinforces intrapersonal intelligence, moral intelligence
and possibly other intelligences. At parochial schools, spiritual intelligence is
naturally nurtured as a matter of course. In other schools, spiritual education can
be introduced in a neutral and factual manner without the promotion of one
religion over the other, or even in a non-religious manner through mindfulness
and meditative exercises. It is believed by their practitioners that mindfulness
and meditative exercises can help nurture systems thinking, another key aspect
of the democratic-ecological curriculum.

Systems Thinking. Thinking in whole systems is at the heart of ecological

literacy. Systems thinking recognizes the world as an integrated whole rather than an
amalgamation of individual elements. Within systems thinking, basic principles of
organization become more important than the analysis of various components of the
system in isolation. Such principles of organization include non-linear relationships, lags,
positive and negative feedback loops, and emergent new properties that are seldom
learned in a traditional classroom. A democratic-ecological literacy curriculum promotes
content that is not singularly focused on memorization of facts and figures, but is
centered around understanding relationships among different agents as part of larger
systems, characteristics and laws governing such systems, and relationships of systems
with other systems.

Web and Circles of Life. Students will be grounded in foundational ecological principles
of life through classroom instruction and outdoor fieldtrips. Such foundational
principles which consists of three dimensions, beginning first with structural elements of
ecosystems, namely the individual flora, fauna abiotic elements such as soil, sunshine

12
Miller, Lisa 2015. The Spiritual Child.

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and rain. This first dimensions is the most intuitive because it is material and observable,
but unfortunately, mainstream understanding of the environment rarely extends
beyond this first dimension. A second dimension is patterns of life, or relationships, e.g.
predatory-prey relationships, parasite-host relationships, symbiosis and competition,
among others. This second dimension is sometimes depicted visually as food webs,
although most food webs typically only on illustrate predator-prey relationships to the
exclusion of others. The third dimension consists of processes, such as photosynthesis,
decomposition, nutrient and water cycling, mutation, speciation and evolution, among
others.13 These second and third dimensions of ecology, especially if imparted at a
young age, begin to embed in the childs consciousness a strong sense of
interconnectedness of everything. This sense of interconnectedness spillovers to
social dimensions by priming students to think holistically beyond ones self, and beyond
the mere present (i.e. history and future), and draw connections among individuals,
communities, bioregions and institutions. Such a sense of interconnectedness is vital for
countering the illusion of separation and othering narrative that pervades our culture.

Academic Scope. Democratic-ecological literacy encompasses more than just

environmental and sustainability topics it is a holistic approach to understanding the
world through systems, grounded on (but not limited to) principles of ecology, and
builds on the understanding of natural systems to extrapolate universal patterns and
lessons that enhance understanding of our social, cultural, political and economic
systems. Certainly, foundational reading, writing, math and science content would be
retained, but the context in which such content is taught would be woven in with moral
and ecological themes. Humanities and social science topics will also be introduced at an
early age, not necessarily explicitly as stand-alone subjects, but incorporated in reading
passages, structured play, and theater. At higher grades, more complex content can be
introduced. Even art and literature have a firm place in ecological literacy since, after all,
systems thinking entails the competence in recognizing relationships and patterns. It is
no coincidence that throughout history, art has made significant contributions to the
development of scientific discoveries.14

Interdisciplinary Approach. Cultivating systems thinking requires, as a pre-requisite, an

interdisciplinary approach to problem solving and explaining the world, resulting in the
collapse of multiple separate subjects into fewer subjects. For instance, chemistry,
physics and biology can be combined into, simply, science. Computer Science can
incorporate biology or chemistry in the form of modelling exercises. English, history and
geography can become and integrated humanities subject at the high school
level. Physical education can be conducted in the great outdoors, incorporating ecology
lessons. Art projects can be used as an opportunity to incorporate biomimetic principles
13
Capra, Fritjof. The Web of Life, in interview with Jeffrey Mishlove, available at
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TLiRXM2oZ_U, accessed Feb 25, 2017.
14
Capra, Fritjof 2005. Speaking Natures Language Principles for Sustainability in Ecoliteracy Educating Our
Children for a Sustainable World, edited by Michael K. Stone and Zenobia Barlow.

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and theater productions can explore social issues or ethical dilemmas. Even reading and
literature can incorporate passages from ethics and environmental writers.

Morality and Ethics. Technical knowledge by itself is insufficient for pro-social decision-
making. It also requires a restoration of civic virtue, a sense of responsibility to our
fellow beings, to other creatures who share this planet with us, and to future
generations. Education can help students practice explicitly reasoning through moral
quandaries, and develop an ethical intuition that informs future decisions, whether
personal or societal. Certainly, every single school without exception should include
some version of morality, ethics, or integrity as part of its core values. In terms of
classroom instruction, humanities subjects, especially history and social studies, provide
natural opportunities to introduce moral and ethics education using historical, real life
events. And as mentioned earlier, the performing arts may be a creative way to explore
interesting ethical issues. As society and schools become more comfortable in
embracing spiritual and religious education, additional avenues for discussing values will
open. Certainly, parochial schools will already naturally be engaging in such instruction.
Yet another way to impart moral education and tapping into ancient wisdom would be
through the history and values of indigenous cultures, which are rich in teachings of
humans proper relationships with its environment and non-human living beings and
can be introduced in social studies, geography or history classes. With global and cross-
cultural perspectives in mind (see discussion below), moral and value frameworks from
international culture can be introduced and analyzed.

Participation, Civic Dialogue and Understanding Power. Students are trained in the
principles and mechanisms of democracy, including respectful discussion, free and fair
voting, legislative initiative, and organizing for action.
o These lessons are put into practice within the classroom and school itself, e.g.
structured discourse on school or student issues, and democratic processes for
selecting new members of student government. In addition, such lessons are
reinforced by exposure to or, where appropriate, exposure to the civic process in
the local community and at other levels of society. Inside and outside the
classroom, principles of democratic action, participation, consultation, and
respect for diverse points of view should be habituated.
o Hand-in-hand with civics education is getting essential understanding of how
power in our society works. As civics educator and former White House official
Eric Liu observes, there is pervasive illiteracy of power, about what it is, who
has it, how it operates, how it flows, what part of it is visible, what part of it is
not, why some people have it, why that's compounded. He explains that as a
result of this general illiteracy, those few who do understand how power
operates in civic life, those who understand how a bill becomes a law, yes, but
also how a friendship becomes a subsidy, or how a bias becomes a policy, or how
a slogan becomes a movement, the people who understand those things wield
disproportionate influence, and they're perfectly happy to fill the vacuum

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created by the ignorance of the great majority.15 If we are to be serious about

nurturing civic participation, we should not shy away from having frank and
serious conversations about power, especially with the higher grade students.

Diversity of Thought and CultureLocally, Regionally and Globally. The curriculum

embraces student diversity as adding to the richness of the educational experience, just
as any ecosystems fitness and resilience is enhanced by biodiversity. This will not be
the case of having student diversity for the sake of diversity, but instead supported by
formal training in interpersonal relationships, communication and collaboration, group
decision making and conflict resolution. As a further step, sister school relationships
with schools in other cities, states or foreign schools can be established, and cross-
cultural exchange relationships, either through teleconference or actual physical
exchange programs as resources permit, would help students begin to forge cross-
border inter-cultural relationships with their counterparts in their sister schools. The
goal is to sow the seeds of connections that can blossom into meaningful friendships,
and consequentially foster knowledge exchange and intercultural appreciation and
literacy. The need for global cultural literacy has never been greater. Even the OECD,
which administers the PISA tests, the international standard for comparing educational
systems around the world, is contemplating the addition of testing for global and
cultural skills to their assessments.16

Place and Community. A democratic-ecological curriculum emphasizes place and

community as an important mode for learning.
o Understanding ones immediate surrounding landscapes, local environments,
bioregion and community embeds patterns of ecological understanding into the
cognition, personality, creativity, and maturity of a learners mind,17 Including
lessons on the benefits of the localism of economic activity (in contrast to
economic activities involving far flung national or global supply chains).
o Understanding the resources of the local and regional community is essential to
assess the resilience of the ecological and social systems.
o It also cultivates a deeper understanding and relationship with the community
and their people, and can lead to the development of real life projects for
learning and application of leadership skills.

Physical Contact with Nature. If one is to understand nature and acquire a naturalistic-
ecological literacy, one must first experience it. And as environmental journalist George
Monbiot has stated so clearly, if children lose contact with nature, they wont fight for

15
Liu, Eric 2013. Why ordinary people need to understand power, TED City 2.0 talk at
https://www.ted.com/talks/eric_liu_why_ordinary_people_need_to_understand_power?language=en.
16
Schleicher, Andreas 2016. Pisa tests to include global skills and cultural awareness in BBC News, at
http://www.bbc.com/news/business-36343602
17
Orr, David W. 2005. Place and Pedagogy in Ecoliteracy Educating Our Children for a Sustainable World,
edited by Michael K. Stone and Zenobia Barlow (quoting Paul Shepard).

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it.18 An ecological literacy program will include nature education inside and outside the
classroom.
o With biophilic architecture in mind, but cognizant of not imposing significant
financial burden on schools, cost-effective actions such as small fish tanks in
each class and a butterfly hatchery on each campus can go a long way to teach
students about life cycles and adaptation.
o There will be a fair amount of getting outside. There is much to learn outside the
classroom. Many science and geography topics are appropriately taught through
touching, feeling and experiencing nature and its laws in action. Such
experiential and hands on learning, all while outdoors in the presence of nature,
is a two-fer they provide first hand experiential learning, which is more
effective than mere classroom lectures, and being outdoors provides added
benefits of fresh air, physical exercise and mental we) would be important
components as antidotes to nature deficit syndrome. Research shows that
simply being in the presence of nature cultivates experiential learning and
curiosity, and goes so far as to nurture a sense of wonder and spiritual-
existential intelligence. A famous study by Edith Cobb published forty years ago
has also been shown a strong link between intense experiences in nature in early
childhood (ages 5 through 12) to stimulation of creativity and imagination.19

Experiential Learning through Community Service. It is well-understood amongst

educators that true learning emerges from actual experience, so classroom learning can
only be considered a stepping stone to the next stage of learning. A thoughtfully
designed community service program for students can serve multiple purposes
creating experiential learning experiences for students to put classroom-taught theory
into practice; to nurture leadership skills of students (also discussed below); to enhance
further engagement of both teachers and parents; support role of teachers as
community leaders and role of schools as new centers of community (see discussion in
Section IV.A. below); and of course, benefit the community.

Courage, Leadership and Entrepreneurship. Ultimately, a democratic-ecological

curriculum should inspire a moral courage to lead and take action. It actively cultivates
understanding, mastery, confidence and leadership in the next generation of
sustainability leaders.
o A leadership program can be embedded in existing curricular or additional
programming. Implementing a teaching-as-learning program, older students
can lead, mentor or teach younger students, either individually, groups or even

18
Monbiot, George 2016. If children lose contact with nature they wont fight for it in The Guardian, Nov 19,
2012, available at https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2012/nov/19/children-lose-contact-with-nature
19
Louv, Richard, 2005, 2008. Last Child in the Woods (citing Cobbs, Edith 1977, The Ecology of Imagination in
Childhood).

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entire classes, to solidify the learning of these older students and cultivate their
communication, teaching and leadership skills.20
o Schools can actively encourage the formation of student-led organizations to
provide opportunities to exercise leadership skills. Such student organizations
may include those with missions based on sports, arts, social causes and business
entrepreneurship, as are commonly found in schools today, and even extend to
systems entrepreneurship, an emerging type of entrepreneurship organized
around addressing system level challenges (such as implementing a democratic-
ecological education system that this white paper proposes).21
o As a natural consequence of this goal, and the elevated social standing of schools
as centers of community, teachers become community leaders. The evolving role
of the teacher in this new education paradigm deserves more attention than we
are able to discuss in this white paper, however two real life examples are
worthy of consideration for implementation within our frameworkKhan Lab
Schools redefinition of the role of a teacher to one of an advisor and mentor,22
and the structured systems thinking training that every educator at Ross School
is provided.23

New Vocabulary and Narratives. Our perception of reality is dependent on the

worldviews and grand narratives we subscribe to. These grand narratives engender
particular sets of vocabulary that reinforce such narrative. A democratic-ecological
educational system introduces a new, positive, democratic and life-honoring vocabulary
to help our students tell the grand stories of the underrepresented, due to class, race,
gender, sexual orientation and even species, to make arguments for and defend the
rights of such constituencies, and ultimately, to lead a transition of change towards a
democratic-ecological society. A mundane example is the word dirt, which
completely underrepresents the life-giving value and essential nature of soil as the
foundation of all life and sustenance. Science fiction novelist Ernest Callenbach
eloquently describes how economics terminology disconnects us from our ecologies -
animals become farm products and mountains become minerals.24 A new
vocabulary and new narratives are needed to equip our leaders with the tools of
persuasion to influence and shape public policy towards the ideals of a more
democratic-ecological society.

20
See Galathe, Michael. Teaching as learning, video produced by Institute for the Future, at
http://extremelearners.iftf.org/#prettyPhoto[iframes]/6/.
21
Ekhtiari, Harmoon, 2015. Dont build a start-up, be a systems entrepreneur, Social Innovation Generation,
available at http://www.sigeneration.ca/dont-build-start-become-systems-entrepreneur/.
22
Khan Labs School, 2017. Learning DesignArt of Teaching, at http://khanlabschool.org/learning-design/art-
teaching, accessed Mar 5, 2017.
23
Ross Institute, 2017. Ross Learning SystemProfessional Development, at
http://www.rosslearningsystem.org/professional-development/, accessed Mar 5, 2017.
24
Callenbach, Ernest 2005. The Power of Words in Ecoliteracy Educating Our Children for a Sustainable World,
edited by Michael K. Stone and Zenobia Barlow.

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Cooperation and Collaboration. The grand narrative of success in life being a product of
winner-take-all competitive advantage results from a misinterpretation of Darwinian
evolutionary theory. The reality is that cooperation and altruistic behavior is at least as
important as survival of the fittest in the success of living species.25 In human
systems, whether it is within the family or the workplace, cooperation or teamwork is
essential. Similarly, the marketplace and economy, alliances, partnerships and joint
ventures are important for commercial success, even in the midst of competition.
Despite all this, performance assessments in schools today are virtually all on the
individual basis there are clear metrics for individual attainment, but scarcely any for
group or team achievement. While promoting autonomy is important to nurture
individual character, intrapersonal skills and self-confidence, it will be vital to also
nurture cooperation, collaboration, and conflict-management skills in preparation for
the real world. With automation replacing many tasks completed by individuals
operating independent of teams, the jobs that are left are increasingly team-based.
Complex problems require teams of folks with different skill sets. After all, many wicked
problems are a result of collective action failures, so it is imperative that students be
equipped with the skills to work in teams. The trend towards collaborative project work
strongly suggests that new metrics to assess effectiveness in collaboration need to be
developed.

Appropriate Role of Technology. A return to nature does not also suggest a return to
stone tablets in favor over digital tablets. On the contrary, a democratic-ecological
curriculum is likely to use digital technology in a more sophisticated manner, to enhance
the understanding of systems thinking and systems dynamics with mind maps and agent-
based computer modelling. This principle of there being an appropriate role for
technology is a microcosm for the limitations of over-reliance on technological solutions
in solving non-linear emergent problems arising out of complex systems with scant
attention paid to behavioral or cognitive dimensions of policy. Techno-utopianism is a
malaise that afflicts many in the authors home bioregion of Silicon Valley. Emerging
studies in neuroscience, behavioral psychology and other related fields are raising our
collective understanding of patterns of human thought and behavior. This new
understanding has profound implications for public policy and strongly suggest that any
viable solution to our biggest social and environmental challenges will need to alter
human consciousness and perceptions to inspire behavioral and cultural shifts, rather
than just present plug-and-play technological gizmos.26

Food Systems. Case studies will be an important pedagogical technique. The food
system is an uniquely ideal case study for the following reasons:

25
Wahl, Daniel C. 2017. Lifes economy is primarily based on collaborative rather than competitive advantage,
Feb 1, 2017, at https://medium.com/age-of-awareness/lifes-economy-is-primarily-based-on-collaborative-rather-
than-competitive-advantage-e7c5f55466fd#.fefbotr1n.
26
For an example of an effort focused on cultural dimensions of tackling global problems, see Brewer, Joe et al.
2017, Grand challenges for the study of cultural evolution, Nature Ecology & Evolution, Vol 1, Art 0070, available
at http://www.nature.com/articles/s41559-017-0070

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o Food is at the nexus of many of our key global issues, including climate change,
overfishing, ocean acidification, deforestation, water scarcity, energy inputs and
bioenergy, soil health and degradation, nutrient and mineral cycles,
globalization, agricultural policy, logistics, international trade, financialization of
commodities, poverty and hunger, environmental justice, ethical quandaries
over genetic engineering, participatory decision-making, nutrition, gardening,
composting, waste and others.
o These topics can be introduced, experienced and learned at age-appropriate
levels throughout a students K-12 journey.
o A common food garden and a nutrition/local/organic-conscious lunchroom
philosophy can go a long way in making these food topics come to life.

Economics and Money. Neoliberal economics, the dominant economic tradition of

modern times and the kind that is taught at almost every school and academic
institution, is perverted and very much at a crossroads.27 At a basic level, it treats
society and the environment as externalities and fails to recognize that the economy is a
subset of society, which in turn is a subset of the ecology. It also confoundingly
presumes that an indefinitely and exponentially growing economy can be supported by
a planet with limited natural resources.28 Separate from economic traditions but at the
core of what drives the economic growth imperative is the poorly understood
mechanism by which almost all of the money in circulation is created, literally out of
thin air, by private banks entering digits in a computer when they make loans to firms
and households.29 Because these loans need to be paid back not only in full, but with
additional interest, it creates pressure on borrowers to earn more revenues by selling
more stuff and promoting every more consumption of natural resources, and hence
economic growth. Throughout history, commentators have observed that those who
control the issuance of money wield disproportionate power over the economy and its
participants.30 The adage that money is the root of all evil is not too far off the truth,
but is typically attributed to human greed, rather than to structural mechanisms
through which money is created in the system and societal power is correspondingly
concentrated. A democratic-ecological education will help high school level students
learn principles of more life-dignifying and society-honoring economic paradigms
embodied in alternative fields such as ecological economics, solidary economics and
participatory economics. In each case the role, genesis and transmission of money in
the system will be a fundamental topic to be elucidated and tackled sooner rather than
later.

27
See, e.g., Lanchester, John. The Major Blindspots of Macroecoomics, New York Times Magazine, Feb 7, 2017,
available at https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/07/magazine/the-major-blind-spots-in-
macroeconomics.html?smprod=nytcore-iphone&smid=nytcore-iphone-share&_r=1 .
28
Lindberg, Erik. Economic GrowthA Primer, Resilience, Feb 22, 2017, at
http://www.resilience.org/stories/2017-02-22/economic-growth-a-primer/.
29
Ibid.
30
See Bendell, Jem, et al. 2014. Money and Society MOOC, Institute of Sustainable Leadership.

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Green Economy Jobs. It would be foolish for educators to engage in the business of
predicting the future job market, especially given current rate of change. However, to
be relevant, it is imperative that we connect at least certain aspects of a democratic-
ecological curriculum as preparation for actual jobs. There should be no compromise to
foundational STEM curriculum, and skills such as GIS mapping can be introduced to
computer science courses, while electrical circuitry will, as is typically be the case, be
part of science lab. The key is to keep abreast of job market trends and adapt skill-
building at the higher grades correspondingly.

IV. Implementing a Democratic-Ecological Educational System

A. New Role for Schools in Society

Restructuring education gives us an opportunity to re-imagine not only a new curriculum, but
to ponder the role of schools in society. Rather than just outposts for training future workers or
closets to stash adolescents in lieu of child care, could schools become the center of a vibrant
community life? Can they, in fact, becoming basic building blocks of the Next System?

The idea of schools as centers of community serves several purposes:

A place for secular culture to convene. In the past, the public square served that
function, but over time was replaced by the big box mall, an unfortunate icon of
consumerist culture. With the mainstreaming of electronic commerce and pushback
against homogenized products, shopping malls are beginning to lose their popularity.
Could schools fill the void of physical spaces and give purpose to public assembly?

Elevates the role of education in society. Making schools a focal point of community
elevates the status of our educators and teachers to community leaders. This also
affirms societys commitment to democratic-ecological principles by putting them at the
center of life, rather than a side activity that is nice to have. A lot more can and needs
be said about the evolving role of the teacher and the challenge of marshalling much
needed resources to nurture the learning and development needs of our educators in
this new democratic-ecological paradigm than this paper provides. One point of
inspiration we would like to note is the six months of mandatory training in systems
thinking, complexity theory and chaos theory that each teacher at the Ross Institute, a
private school based in New York, must undertake.31

Consistent exposure reminds us that education is part of living. Instead of a focus on

credentialing, these dozen years of formal education should result in practiced daily
behaviors. By keeping the school as a locus of community life, the ethical principles and
methods from that environment more easily come to mind outside the schools walls.

31
Ross Institute, video on Ross Learning System Sustainability Thread at http://www.rosslearningsystem.org/
(accessed Mar 5, 2017)

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As this new conception of the centrality of the school in community takes hold,
communities may decide to expand on the audience of the their schools to include adult
education, with the principle of life-long education in mind.32 Life-long learning will take
on increasing importance with the onset of automation and the consequential loss of
jobs in many industrial sectors.

B. Vision
Consistent with David Orrs insight that all education is environmental education, our vision is
for democratic-ecological literacy principles and content to serve as the foundation for every
pre-K-12 curriculum in the United States and other parts of the world. Consequently, with
democratic-ecological literacy evolving into baseline life skill for every citizen, we imagine a
future where collective decision-making at all levels, from personal decision-making on product
purchases to the discourse and election of our public official will be better informed, ethically
guided, and sensitive to the needs of our community and ecology. Our public schools will take
on a new role as centers of community, initially by serving the institutional role of nurturing our
children and transmitting democratic-ecological literacy.

C. Mission
To accelerate the incorporation of democratic-ecological literacy principles and content in
every pre-K-12 curriculum in the United States and other parts of the world to enable each
citizen to achieve his her or full potential and contribute to collective decision-making that is
better informed, ethically guided, and sensitive to societal, communal and ecological needs.

D. Goals and Milestones

Our vision and mission statements are ambitious, as all such statements should be. To realize
them, we will need a new network of institutions, practices, ideas and norms. Having sketched
out the features of a democratic-ecological curriculum offering, we propose a multi-phase
implementation strategy over 15 years.

1. Establish Center of Excellence - Year 0 onwards

We will create of a center of excellence (CoE) that will carry out the following actions:

a. Create Community.

i. Map out the ecosystem of schools, school districts, and non-profit

organizations that are already supporting some form of democratic-
ecological literacy, and categorize them according to various
typologies. Among other things, this mapping exercise will help us identify

32
There are pilot programs of life-long schools being started today. We are aware of a new school being
established in Shanghai that will cater to educating students from ages 3 through 70.

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potential allies, funders, partners, and pilot testing schools to roll out
ecological literacy curricula.
ii. As we will create community, content and capacity, we will solidify our
relationships with like-minded schools, school districts, research and
advocacy organizations and other strategic partners to leverage resources of
the network and strengthen the movement of mainstreaming democratic-
ecological literacy.

b. Create Content. With internal resources and in partnership with leading experts,
develop democratic-ecological literacy resources, pedagogical techniques,
implementation diagnoses and other related content. Such content would be
tailored for different age groups and grade levels so that they are age and context
appropriate. They will be open sourced so that they are freely available to the
world, and freely editable so that contributions worldwide are accepted. The open
source model is necessary not only to accelerate the development of content, but to
provide a mechanism for the adaptation of content to local contexts, cultures and
climate.

c. Create Capacity. The CoE will not only offer its resources online, but also provide
human intellectual capital via consultation where practical, and bring in experts,
specialists and students of ecological literacy where opportunity arises. Through
partnerships with existing outdoor education organizations, the CoE provide a will
also develop and design outdoor and nature education programs tailored to
different contexts, geographies and times of year.

Ultimately, the CoE will serve as a nexus of a global community of democratic-ecological

literacy advocates, practitioners and supporters.

2. Establish a Research and Public Advocacy Unit (Year 2 onwards)

Create a research, public advocacy and change management unit that will, through
partnerships with school districts, PTAs and relevant county and state education agencies,
develop strategies for the diffusion and incorporation of ecological literacy in schools. This unit
would be focused on the business side (as opposed to curriculum side) of educational change,
articulating the value case for prioritizing democratic-ecological literacy, developing the
roadmap for implementation, and charting the course for funding.

As much as possible, democratic-ecological literacy must be framed, not as an additional

burden to school districts and schools imposed from above that will compete with other
priorities for resources, but as a platform to address existing thorny issues facing such school
districts and schools. To address what Ann Evans describes as the snicker factor (i.e. the
you cant be serious reaction to such proposal to make democratic-ecological literacy a
priority by educators facing pressing problems of high dropout rates, absenteeism, low
academic achievement, campus violence and teacher shortages and so on), we will need to

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make the case for how democratic-ecological curricula are in fact solutions for these
problems.33

For example, we expect that outdoor education and field trips, constructivist approaches to
classroom pedagogy and the cultivation of a sense of responsibility through life-giving tasks
such as nurturing the school garden will likely result in more engaged learning, lower
absenteeism and lower dropout rates. We expect a more humanistic education that equips
children with community values and conflict resolutions schools to have a positive impact on
reducing campus violence. We also expect the elevated status of schools and teachers to
benefit retention of teachers. We will need to gather data with the help of partners in our
network to support these hypotheses and strengthen our case.

3. Establish Model Dem-Eco-schools (Year 5 onwards for first school in California; Year
10 onwards in select other states and countries).

Concurrent with establishing a network of like-minded schools that incorporate or adopt

democratic-ecological curricula and depending on the status of progress of our efforts, we may
find it useful and even necessary to establish model democratic-ecological schools that fully
adopt the principles set forth in this essay. Our instinct is that California would be the ideal site
for the first school in the United States given the concentration of existing resources and
general political climate and history of its citizenry. Internationally, Taiwan may be a viable test-
bed for establishing such a model school system, given its democratic and progressive politics,
commitment to environmental sustainability at all levels of society, and tradition of
transformative action by civil society.

E. Partnerships and Funding

We will be in a better position to identify specific partners and funders after we have
completed the community mapping exercise described above. Preliminarily, we see promising
work in California from programmatic organizations such as the Center for Ecological Literacy
and Nature Bridge, and schools such as the Indigo Program in San Jose, and outdoor wilderness
bodies such as the National Wildlife Education Association. Girl Scouts of the USA and Boy
Scouts of America are also potential collaborators due to the overlap of values of citizenship
and care for nature.

In Taiwan, the Buddhist Tzu Chi Foundation has done innovative work with setting up recycling
centers island-wide staffed by local volunteers in the community, while also developing more
humanistic educational opportunities. As one of Asias largest humanitarian organizations, it is
a viable partner for a democratic-ecological educational initiative.

33
Ann Evans, Changing Schools: A Systems View in Ecoliteracy Educating Our Children for a Sustainable World,
edited by Michael K. Stone and Zenobia Barlow.

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On the funding side, we will seek out philanthropic foundations and socially conscious
businesses to lend support to the mission of the CoE.

V. Conclusion
As the saying goes, it takes a village to raise a child. But what if the village is no longer up to the
task? What if the village falls short of instilling the right set of values to be a responsible citizen
and right framework for understanding ecological principles to be more responsible stewards of
nature? A deficient village describes where we are now today. But imagine now, if that child,
and others like her, are equipped with the right skills, insights, empathy and moral courage to
exercise choices at home and in their neighborhood, vote on referenda and public officials, and
contribute to discourse on public policies. What if schools evolve from being the factories of
compliant workers to new centers of flourishing communities, and nurturers of the next
generation of moral and self-actualized citizens who can correctly shape the Next
System? What if, it is in fact the children who need to reshape the village? A democratic-
ecological literacy approach may be a possible means to help society in that task.

***

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About the Authors

Julian L. Wong is a social innovation consultant at A Whole Person Economy. Until recently,
Julian was an attorney at Wilson Sonsini Goodrich & Rosati, the premier technology law firm in
the Silicon Valley, where he advised technology startup companies, many in the sustainability
field, on corporate law matters. Julian was previously a senior policy analyst for climate and
energy issues at the Center for American Progress, a Washington D.C.-based think tank, and a
policy advisor on U.S.-China energy relations at the U.S. Department of Energy. He attributes
his ecological leanings, which were shaped during his childhood, to his fathers love of nature
and animals, mothers thriftiness on water and electricity consumption, and his inference from
Catholic teachings of the equivalency of God with nature. Julian grew up in Singapore where he
witnessed Asias hyper-development and destruction of local ecologies. He obtained his JD and
MA in environmental policy from Duke University, and BA in Biology from Pomona College. He
also completed a Fulbright Scholarship a Beijings Tsinghua University School of Law where he
wrote extensively on Chinas renewable energy and environmental policies. Julian currently
lives with his wife and two children in San Jose, California.

Kevin F. Hsu is an urban scientist who teaches International Policy Studies and Urban Studies at
Stanford University. He co-founded the Human Cities Initiative, exploring how cities can
embody four pillars of sustainability: environmental quality, economic vitality, social equity and
cultural continuity. As head of Skyship Design, an educational design studio, he developed
innovative educational offerings with a social mission, including massive open online courses
(MOOC) on international womens health, human rights, and democratic development. He
fondly remembers flipping through magazines about endangered species in his youth and
learning about how we might take action to save our fellow living beings. At present, he works
on both sides of the Pacific, researching urban infrastructure, human communities and public
participation in Shanghai and San Francisco. Kevin has degrees from Stanford in Earth Systems,
International Relations, and Civil & Environmental Engineering.

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