Starting the discussion - ideas and initial thoughts

What do people think? What do you think the value of outdoor space in schools is? Comment below! :-)

Following on from the LOtC manifesto of 2006, many of these questions were hashed out in detail in 2009-10 by the Education Select Committee who came up with a pretty good set of recomendations to govt: http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm200910/cmselect/cmchilsch/418/41802.htm
A few months later, following the last general election, the official coalition govt. response to the report was absolutely gutting. http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/cm201011/cmselect/cmeduc/525/52505.htm
I think that whilst small policy changes are vital to remove barriers, focussing soley on them can mask the need to address the much bigger structural socio-economic issues which need to change for the tinkering to have any lasting meaning. I think David alluded to this in the film when standing by the advertising hoarding that had reverted to a car advert.

Thanks for the links, Richard. They make really interesting reading.

Completely agree that we need to cast the net much further and really change people's behaviour. But I think one of the ways to do that is by making what might be quite small changes in schools.

Have things changed at all since the Education Committee report or is the situation worse? Does it make the case for big policy ideas/changes all the greater?

Tom

I agree about small changes - we have to do something, at the very least to avoid sinking into some sort of Lovelockian nihilism. I would say the situation is much worse since the report and the causes are not just policies relating to schools, children, young people and families. The commodification of outdoor experience continues, supported by govt policies like acadamisation and the resulting chipping away (commissioning / privatisation) of local authority outdoor provision. There are lots of great people doing lots of great work but it continues to be a struggle. The promotion of volunteerism and the scrabble for grant funding are making the world of outdoor learning and play much more corporate and cut-throat. There are some 'social enterprises' in action and others only in name. Practitoners who in the past would have gladly collaborated are competing against each other on price for schools 'business'. This drives down salaries and lowers the percieved value of practioners skills and work. It forces experienced and passionate people into other careers as they just cant survive on the warm, fluffy feeling of the outdoor opportunities they offer children. Put bluntly it pushes those who wish to solve the problems addressed by the Wild Network into being part of the problem (and I reluctantly put myself in that bracket now). I think we need to tackle the neo-liberal language of this government in whatever policy proposals we make and replace the pithy campaign soundbites and trite cat-poster aphorisms with some critical substance. Sorry about the rant! I'm not really that bitter :) I think the case for BIG policy ideas is made. I'm glad you folks are working on this and look forward to seeing what comes out of it.

So the solution is to cut commissioning by local authority of outdoor learning provision?

'Lovelockian nihilism', I may need to look that up! I agree there is much more of a cut throat approach to learning outdoors provision competition than there used to be, I wonder if there is something that we can reflect in policy that might help redress this? Not sure what that is but you are right Richard, it is a worrying state of affairs.

I think the school grounds are massively under-used, as a resource. More effort should perhaps be put into using these grounds after school and at weekends, with parents and their kids, so that they can take part in outdoor activities like bush craft, plant/minibeast ID, outdoor skills etc etc. We need to try and help parents to be more prepared, more confident (and to a degree expected) to engage with their kids, as a family, in the outdoors.

Hi Tim, interesting thought, so should we perhaps be asking Government to make it easier for schools to open to their communities out of education hours? Currently there are a lot of barriers to this and hoops that they have to jump through but perhaps we could put our collective thinking behind what might make it easier - what about financial benefits for schools who do this maybe?

Tom,
I don't think local authorities are commissioning outdoor learning provision as it isn't statutory. They have in several cases sold their outdoor learning centres as part of the bundle when hiving off services to schools to be run by third parties eg. Babcock in Devon. We could afford youth workers, LEA outdoor centres etc in the tough times of the 1970s so why not in the relatively more affluent 21st century. I'd like to see an end to commissioning of all services for the public good (eg. in health and education) from profit making bodies.

Juno, I was referring to the great doom-monger James Lovelock!. The Gaia Atlas of Planet Management sitting on my Geography teacher's desk in the 1980s was one of the things that started me off on this track. Now in his 80's Mr. Lovelock reckons we are all doomed so might as well go for a hedonistic blow-out as we only have 20 decent years of human habitiation left.