Investigating the Practice of Sustainability Education at North American Folk Schools
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Date
2015-05Author
Bussiere, Annie
Publisher
University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, College of Natural Resources
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
The sustainability/DIY/green movement in North America is growing rapidly and folk
schools have been a part of it since the beginning. Despite support for the movement,
there is little to know research into the connection between organizations that teach
sustainability living skills and sustainability education. This study investigated the
practice of sustainability education at folk schools across North America. Mission
statements from 19 folk schools were analyzed using mixed inductive and deductive
coding content analysis to answer the question: as “What are folk schools doing, how are
they doing it, in what learning environment, and to whom.” Subsequently, information
from 5 websites were analyzed in depth using in depth deductive content analysis with
the Cloud Institute standards for Sustainability Education as themes as well as Wordle
word clouds and word/phrase frequency generators. Ultimately, the research supports
that folk schools are in fact practicing sustainability education and barriers/implications
for future research and collaboration are discussed. A new working definition of folk
school as well as a folk school directory were created as a final product.