Educate

Our acclaimed programs include:

Field Experiences—We take students outside to explore the Chesapeake Bay watershed and learn how we can all take action to save the Bay. We offer unique outdoor education experiences—on the water and on land—in some of the region's most inspiring places. (See a field experience in action.)

Teacher Professional Development—We form lasting relationships with teachers and administrators and support their work to incorporate watershed learning into the classorom through our Chesapeake Classrooms professional development courses, mentor networks, and curriculum resources.

School Leaders Environmental Leadership Program—CBF supports school principals and administrators in environmental stewardship opportunities for their entire school community. Through experience, training, resources, and collegial discussion, school leaders learn how to design a school program that incorporates and benefits the local environment.

Student Leadership—Our Student Leadership Program provides students with opportunities to tackle the watershed issues they care about; improve their planning, teambuilding, and leadership skills; and use their voices to improve the health of the Chesapeake Bay watershed and its communities.

Find out more about our Education Program and Resources.

Meaningful Watershed Experiences

Integrating state learning standards with explorations of local waterways, our programs provide a "meaningful watershed education experience" as defined by the Chesapeake Bay Program. Programs are supported and created in collaboration with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association and the National Geographic Society.

Opportunities include exploration of local wetlands by canoe or a day aboard a traditional watermen's workboat or modern research vessel. In the heart of the Chesapeake, our island centers provide a unique insight into how the livelihoods of watermen are connected to the Bay, offering participants the opportunity to interact with surrounding 300-year-old fishing communities.

CBF's environmental education opportunities link the natural environment and human culture of the Chesapeake. They enable students and teachers to conduct their own research through biological sampling, chemical analysis, and physical measurements. In addition to using critical thinking skills to evaluate the health of the ecological system, participants also gain a unique perspective in the relationship between water quality, fisheries, and economics. Our courses combine many academic disciplines, such as earth science, biology, history, art, English/writing, math, chemistry, civics, economics, government, and responsible citizenship.

Innovative teaching methods and a knowledgeable, enthusiastic education staff have put CBF at the vanguard of the environmental education movement. The result is an exceptionally informed and inspired constituency that values the Bay and its watershed as a living, connected system. Read what people are saying out our education programs.

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