Pereira is a traditional coffee growing eco-region in Colombia facing rapid and unsustainable development. During this educational program, some of the largest issues Pereira was facing included air and water pollution and threats to open and public spaces.
The Pereira Green Map program aimed to provide a holistic lesson plan with hands-on environmental activities that were appropriate for different age groups and educational needs. These activities were tailored to one rural school, Institución Educativa Gonzalo Mejía Echeverry, and two urban public schools, Colegio Deogracias Cardona and Institución Educativa Suroriental Gustavo Arango Garrido.
Each school developed a “mobile Green Map mural,” which were presented at each campus and in their surrounding neighborhoods. The students and educators distributed a total of 5,000 printed Green Maps. As tangible outcomes, these maps offered a message of inspiration to the local communities and increased policy makers' awareness of youth's demands for the region.
Each Green Map has made an impact by passing on local knowledge as interpreted by the student mapmakers and has motivated other communities in Colombia and around the planet to develop similar Green Map projects. Download one here.
Read more about La Fundacion GeoVida below in Spanish and see their Impact Story in English, here .
We are promoting the use of Green Mapping and its research and communication methodology to help youth express their concerns and hopes for the local environment to their peers, community members, and politicians.
These Youth Green Maps focus on the conservation of natural resources, on the promotion of cultural wealth in aspects of environmental justice in a direct and pragmatic way.
The GeoVida Foundation is responsible for the training and workshops by providing students with information from experts and experiential activities in the environmental field about the sites and situations they are mapping. This pilot project offers tools and material resources to one rural and two urban public schools located in the area of the municipality of Pereira. Now, we are planning the propagation of this seed in the Eje Cafetero ecoregion.
Our participants and their families come from low-income communities. The age range of the students in the three public schools ranges from 7 to 17 years old. This project directly involves more than 150 students with the leadership and assistance of more than 20 GeoVida Foundation mentors, teachers, volunteers, and community members.
We hope that more than 15,000 people in the surrounding community will benefit from using the Green Maps and so will journalists and politicians. We also hope that trained personnel can replicate this experience in other communities and that our results will be inspirational in other low-income and/or Spanish-speaking communities around the world.
This municipality is located in the coffee region of Risaralda in a small valley that descends from a part of the western Andes mountain range. It contains wonderful and diverse cultural and natural resources waiting to be discovered while environmental problems wait to be solved. Pereira has developed an important industrial and commercial center, and is also facing rapid urban development that threatens open and public spaces, increasing pollution of air and water resources, unsustainable land uses, among others.
With Green Mapping, young people are gaining a better understanding and appreciation for the place they live. In addition to this, they are getting involved in issues of sustainable agriculture, food security, reforestation, hydroponics, recycling and waste management; eco-literature, social responsibility, critical thinking, design and communication, which are part of the lesson. By using the youth resources of the Green Map System, a plan was created that could be adapted to all ages and all pedagogical needs for each school with the support of the GeoVida Foundation.
Green Map System provided a Tool Kit (printed and digital materials, the Green Map Resource Guide, archival materials, multimedia CDs, USB sticks, a selection of Green Maps, and much more). Thanks to the support of the Captain Planet Foundation, the translation of these tools into Spanish was carried out to support the needs of educators and to motivate the development of new resources that will be shared in the future with other Youth Mappers around the world. (You can find youth resources in Spanish in the GMS Tool Center).
Other expected results
- Thematic Green Maps about reforestation, recycling and others, in printed and mural formats. We also hope to publish the development and final product of the Green Maps at different scales that will reflect the students' findings and concerns. Additionally, special events will promote the maps in the Pereira area.
- This project will contextually promote the adoption of a new environmental curriculum.
Green Mapping is an interactive process from the planning stage and there are valuable lessons at every step. The research, design, realization, promotion of the results are part of that process. This process, together with the energy of the Mappers, will create a sense of place, facilitate dialogue and the transformation of realities in the perspective that young people have of the environment.
Educators in Colombia are gaining valuable skills by helping young people identify the resources and problems of the local environment within a global context. They are connecting schools with the natural and built environment of their immediate surroundings.
Finally, Green Maps, the tangible product of this process will be a lasting contribution and a message of inspiration at different levels: the government and politicians will listen and see the demands of young people, the Mappers involved in this project will become Youth Mentors and they will pass on their knowledge and methodologies locally, and other communities will be motivated to develop more projects of this type. Together, we are educating youth, empowering and engaging communities and investing in the future of the next generations.
