Conservation Education Partnerships in Schoolyard Laboratories: a Call Back to Action

How Many Species Are There? Public Understanding and Awareness of Biodiversity in Switzerland

“…In consequence, they might not be able or even willing to teach about biodiversity. In a recent study, nature-based investigations which are seen as an important component of biodiversity education (McLeish 1997;Van Weelie and Wals 2002), were found to be particularly restricted by the belief of teachers that they would require more specialist knowledge than they have (Brewer 2002). The term biodiversity encompasses a broad spectrum of biotic scales, from genetic variation within species to biomes of the planet and is frequently described in terms of numbers of genotypes, species, or ecosystems (IUCN, UNEP and WWF 1991;Hooper et al 2005).…”

Perceived Vulnerability to Disease Predicts Environmental Attitudes

“…Unfortunately, increased efforts of world leaders (Butchart et al 2010) to improve critical situation in environmental protection were still not translated to significant changes to promote biodiversity of the general public: knowledge about biodiversity loss is low (Balmford et al 2002, Lindemann-Matthies & Bose 2008, Robelia & Murphy 2012) and the real pro-environmental behavior of citizens is insufficient (Kuhlemeier et al 1999). Environmental education is recently believed to be an effective tool that may help to reverse negative trends in biodiversity loss and increasing environmental pollution (e.g., Wilson 1996, Brewer 2002.…”

Pub. Info.

“…There are substantial grounds to recognize not only the connection between attitudes and behaviour but also the connection between educational initiatives and attitude formation. Finding ways to reconnect people to nature is a critical challenge for conservation biologists in this new century (Brewer, 2002). Due to the connections mentioned above, this critical challenge must also be met in the classroom.…”

“…Effective solutions to environmental problems require active participation of scientifically and technologically literate citizens (Brewer, 2002).…”