The Atlantic Salmon Conservation Schools Network is an innovative project which uses the context of Atlantic Salmon to bring young people together in a collaborative study, exploring a variety of complex environmental issues. This project is designed to place ICT and specifically Geo-media at the heart of the project. An overarching objective is to develop a framework to enable collaborative studies of environmental issues with outputs fully embedded in the digital age. Atlantic salmon are found throughout the bio-region of the North Atlantic. They inhabit the rivers and seas of a significant number of European countries within their range. As they are a migratory species, they therefore face an array of environmental pressures. The studying of Atlantic salmon acts as a catalyst to investigate these numerous environmental problems in the fields of sustainable food production, ecotourism, renewable energy, pollution, agricultural impact, forestry, ecosystem management, fishery management, conservation methods and most notably climate change. Each partner country within the project presents a different perspective to study these issues. This opportunity has enabled the development of 4 distinct themes; (a)The value of Atlantic salmon.(b)A comparison between Baltic and Atlantic salmon.(c)The southern range of the Atlantic Salmon.(d) Industry and Atlantic Salmon. The project will provide 78 students aged 16 to 18 years, from the UK, Finland, France, Germany and Greenland an opportunity to participate. The students are from a range of socio-economic backgrounds. A variety of methods will be used to deliver the project aims. These will include field trips, collection of environmental data, workshops and seminars all of which are underpinned by an inquiry-based learning approach. The project outputs by the students will be collaborative in nature and consist of video presentations incorporated into Geo-media applications. The methodology used, will foster relationships between schools and established conservation communities. The project will make full use of social media as a means of dissemination and also to promote future engagement by schools not involved in this project. This will be done be enabling contributions by other schools to the Geo-media outputs as well as inclusion in the ongoing eTwinning project. Such an approach ensures a sustainable legacy of the project results.This project provides an opportunity to engage young people in science and environmental learning in an innovative way. It also provides a route to increasing skills for life and skills for life long learning. This is in addition to the increased capacity of teachers and schools to deliver ICT based environmental learning. The project will also place schools in a more central position with regard to community led conservation initiatives.
The Atlantic Salmon Conservation Schools Network is an innovative project which uses the context of Atlantic Salmon to bring young people together in a collaborative study, exploring a variety of complex environmental issues. This project is designed to place ICT and specifically Geo-media at the heart of the project. An overarching objective is to develop a framework to enable collaborative studies of environmental issues with outputs fully embedded in the digital age. Atlantic salmon are found throughout the bio-region of the North Atlantic. They inhabit the rivers and seas of a significant number of European countries within their range. As they are a migratory species, they therefore face an array of environmental pressures. The studying of Atlantic salmon acts as a catalyst to investigate these numerous environmental problems in the fields of sustainable food production, ecotourism, renewable energy, pollution, agricultural impact, forestry, ecosystem management, fishery management, conservation methods and most notably climate change. The aim of the project was to deliver an innovative pedagogical project to improve the teaching of environmental issues. The utilization of a single species with a wide geographical distribution and intercultural iconic significance was adopted as vehicle for the stated aim. The participating organisations subscribed to delivering this aim with the support of relevant stakeholders within their local context. The project had 4 distinct themes; (a)The value of Atlantic salmon.(b)A comparison between Baltic and Atlantic salmon.(c)The southern range of the Atlantic Salmon.(d) Industry and Atlantic Salmon. The project will provide 78 students aged 16 to 18 years, from the UK, Finland, France, Germany and Greenland an opportunity to participate. The students are from a range of socio-economic backgrounds. A variety of methods were to be used to deliver the project aims. The project was highly innovative. It used a single species to teach in context a wide array of environmental challenges, liking directly to sustainable living in terms of food sources, economy and energy. The wide spread of participants geographically added to the global sense of the project and the sense of environmental challenges being global. Inter cultural attitudes towards sustainable living objectives were also explored and experienced. The development of ICT skills such as the use of Geo-media applications in studying environmental issues were central to all mobilities. All students had the opportunity to engage worth this type of learning and all students across all the mobilities developed greater ICT skills. The implementation of the teaching and learning activities were delivered in accordance with the stated aims in the application. The aims of developing scientific skills as planned were exceeded. Student had opportunities to deliver such skills due to the collaborative work schools were able to organise with local universities, environmental NGOs and STEM outreach programmes. At international the project was recognized as mentioned and then replicated beyond Europe. Including the participating schools at total of 15 schools across 8 countries have engaged with project. Approximately 500 students and stakeholders have engaged with the project either through participation directly, participation through replication or by hosting visiting students. Beyond the life of the Erasmus funded project, the Atlantic Salmon conservation Schools Network is now running in North America with 4 schools and links with the original partner schools within this project. The project is now a listed event in the International Year of the Salmon 2019 and the Atlantic Salmon Conservation Schools Network, born out of this project remains an observer NGO of the NASCO international treaty and is invited to report annually and attend the annual inter governmental NASCO meeting.