School Programs at Urban Ecology Center

Flying kites in Riverside Park . . . baking cookies in a solar oven . . . tapping maple trees for syrup . . . donning hip waders and carrying magnifying glasses to look for damselflies, leeches, clams and crayfish in the Milwaukee River . . . . Students at UEC get so involved in what they’re doing — and have so much fun — they don’t even realize how much they’re learning!

A New Model for Environmental Learning

The philosophy behind our school programs is based on research which shows two things make a person environmentally aware:

• constant contact with nature early in life and
  
• an adult mentor (parent, teacher, friend) who demonstrates positive behavior toward the environment.
  

In the city, people often live in apartment buildings and school grounds are often covered in cement. The Urban Ecology Center offers unique urban sanctuaries and “outdoor laboratories” for neighborhood school children. The Center’s staff and volunteers serve as adult mentors to guide students, year after year, as they progress through school.

Neighborhood Environmental Education Project

In the nationally recognized Neighborhood Environmental Education Program (NEEP), we partner with schools within a 2-mile radius of Riverside and Washington parks. Rather than arranging for single field trips, each participating school signs up for an entire year. This provides them with multiple visits to the park, spread throughout the school year, and ongoing participation in the program each year. And at a time when physical education programs are being cut, the Center offers valuable sporting opportunities, including rock climbing, canoeing, hiking and snowshoeing.

Did you know...

The Urban Ecology Center provides 15,000 student visits annually through its school environmental educational program in two urban parks?

Urban Ecology Center
Partnering Schools 2008-2009

Atwater Elementary School
Carver Academy
Cass Street School
Catholic East Elementary
Clara Mohammad School
Clarke Street School
Downtown Montessori Academy
Elm Creative Arts
Escuela Fratney
Franklin Pierce Elementary School
French Immersion School
Gaenslen Elementary School
Golda Meir Gifted & Talented
Hartford Avenue School
Highland Community School
The Hope Middle School
Lake Bluff Elementary School
Lee Elementary School
Lincoln Center of the Arts
Lloyd St. School
Maryland Ave. Montessori School
Milwaukee Academy of Sciences
Milwaukee Education Center
Milwaukee Renaissance Academy
Mount Olive Lutheran Grade School
Neeskara Elementary
O.W. Holmes Elementary
Roosevelt Middle School
Saint Sebastian Grade School
Sharon Junior Academy
St Marcus School
St. Coletta Day School of Milwaukee
St. Robert’s School
Story Elementary
Urban Day School (12th & 24th St. campuses)
Urban Waldorf School
Westside Academy

Preschool Programs

Young ones experience an adventure in our forest and on the habitat playground. On short field trips, preschoolers learn about the world around them through games, songs, stories and hands-on projects with new friends, both human and otherwise!

Teacher Workshops

Professional development programs that are fun and interesting!

Past workshops have included:

· Earth Partnership (urban gardening)

· The Leopold Education Project (creating ecological literacy)

· Project Wet (watershed issues) and ozone monitoring