Gulf Islands Centre for Ecological Learning: A framework for the future

This project involved an in-depth investigation of the history, current status and possible future directions of the Gulf Islands Centre for Ecological Learning (GICEL), whose overall mission is to help learners increase their ecological literacy so that they may integrate lessons from nature into their everyday decision-making. Content analyses of key GICEL documents and transcripts of semi-structured interviews with selected GICEL leaders led to the identification of commonly-held guiding principles, program structures, and learning outcomes that were then synthesized into a program framework which will provide a foundation for the future implementation of a GICEL residential school group program. Based on this research, major learning outcomes for the new program include ecological literacy, ecological citizenship, personal development and positive community residency for school-aged children from southwest British Columbia.