The project was aimed to foster environmental awareness and sustainability skills in young people by activating schools and teachers to sign up to the European Blue School Network which promotes the Ocean Literacy activities. The project achieved this goal by 1) successfully implement as a pilot project an inclusive and comprehensive EU Blue School Network in the confined regional area of Mallorca over the short term of 13 months by creating a true grass-roots approach that includes teachers, schools and local environmental actors, and, 2) document this approach in a BluePrint that enables other EU regions to follow this example and successfully recruit a large Network of European Blue Schools. implementing a true grass-roots approach that includes teachers, schools and local environmental actors in a pilot action to overcome current hindrances and by documenting this approach in a BluePrint Guide to enable other EU regions to follow this example.
BACKGROUND Partners of We are Blue Schools applied to this project in order to successfully bring the important concept of Ocean Literacy to the classrooms. Whilst the concept had been well researched and defined and an array of academic documents have been published, its implementation into schools in Europe had been minimal at the time of writing the application. THE NEEDS ADDRESSED Academics, administrations and EU projects had developed outstanding materials and concepts, but the connection to the schools and the individual teachers wasn't established. Before this project, even on an island such as Mallorca with its strong marine infrastructure, no school had been certified as a Blue School, and the project needs analysis confirmed that hardly any teacher had heard of the Ocean Literacy concept. Furthermore: 1) School teachers had not been involved into the implementation plans of the Ocean Literacy concept which led to the low success rate. 2.) Local NGOs and other stakeholders that are active in environmental protection and marine conservation are well aware of the importance to bring environmental and marine subjects into the schools, but their collaboration with the schools at local level was minimal.