We are thrilled to invite you to a special event celebrating the upcoming release of my new book, Response-Able: How to Live Well Over Time on Planet Earth!
🌎 Pre-Sale Launch Event Details
Date: May 15, 2025
Time: 12:00 PM – 1:30 PM EST
Location: Online (registration link will be shared after you sign up)
Jaimie Cloud, of the Cloud Institute for Sustainable Education and Jenny Schinella of Dutchess BOCES join the Green Radio Hour with Jon Bowermaster to talk about just how important it is today to introduce 'sustainability' into every crevice of our education system. Click here to listen to the radio show
Read MoreJaimie recently spoke at the "Education for Resilient Cities with Climate Storyteller Partnership held by the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University. She discussed some frameworks that will help to re-think the resilience of cities and its planning process. She also drew various links to education!
Dear Readers,
I started a unit plan to respond to the unacceptable things people have been saying and doing in the U.S. because of racism, sexism and xenophobia. I draw from the Enduring Understandings, Standards and Performance Indicators of Education for Sustainability. I completed Stage I and invite educators everywhere to build out Stages II and III as appropriate for your students, grade levels and disciplines.
We ask:
How can the new brain science help us to understand what is going on when people feel threatened by “the other”?
Throughout history, there are many examples of people who stood to gain economically and/or politically from creating and fueling conflict between diverse groups of people. Is the U.S. experiencing this phenomenon right now? Who stands to gain? Who stands to lose?
What good does diversity do us?
What do we need to know?
What kind of future do we want?
Please share your unit plans with us and with our larger community. This is a participatory design process and I look forward to seeing what you will build from this foundation.
Jaimie P. Cloud
How do we educate for the kind of future we want?
When I first heard about "sustainability" in 1987 it changed my entire framework as an educator... here's my Storigin:
The Three E's as a Design and Decision Making Tool - Two-Part Webinar on Feb. 4 & 11, 2020
This two-part, interactive and dynamic webinar is presented by Dr. Koh Ming Wei. Participants will make use of several senses to explore and engage with the multi-layered concepts of equity, economics and environment. Outcomes include confidence to apply the Three Es as a design and decision-making tool in personal, professional, and cultural settings.
Read MoreThe Cloud Institute is working with partners to build momentum for Education for Sustainability and Youth Leadership in the Hudson Valley!
Here’s a brief timeline of activities:
Read MoreThe Cloud Institute uses The Fish Game to start the conversation about education for sustainability. The transformative learning experience encourages thinking and new ideas about system dynamics and interdependence. Through their experience, the 'players' realize how much their thinking drives their behavior and how much, in the context of interdependence, their behavior makes a difference.
Read MoreThe Cloud Institute is dedicated to the vital role of education in creating awareness, fostering commitment, and guiding actions toward a healthy, secure and sustainable future for ourselves and for future generations.
The unique challenges that define our time require fundamentally new ways of thinking. If we intend to transition to a sustainable way of life, educators and young people have a critical role to play. Join us as we explore what’s possible when we educate for sustainability.
Read MoreInspiring Kids: Operation Gyre & Project Pure Water
These video animations were designed and produced by high school students in the Philomath High Robotics Engineering Division (PHRED) at Philomath HS in Philomath, Oregon. These two 30 second animations are from PHRED Team 847. PHRED Team 847 is sponsored by local foundations, corporations and the Lions Club.
Operation Gyre is an elegant 30 second demonstration of several EfS attributes including authentic curriculum and assessment, the entrepreneurial mindset, an understanding of the materials cycle principle and three of our enduring understandings: “A Healthy and Sustainable Future is Possible”; “Live by the Natural Laws” and “Read the Feedback”.
Pure Water 847 is another elegant 30 second demonstration of authentic curriculum and assessment, the entrepreneurial mindset, Biomimicry and “A Sustainable Future is Possible.” In addition, the animations illustrate a robust use of technology in the classroom (Autodesk 3ds Max).
Our work with the NYC Department of Education’s High School Career Technical Education continues and has now been merged into the CTE Academic Integration Blueprint. This document aims to bridge the gap between graduation rate and low college readiness by facilitating the integration of CTE and academic coursework, training teachers to develop integrated curriculum and promoting high quality project-based learning (PBL) practices in academic classes. One of the plan’s five objectives is to “Infuse sustainability principles throughout CTE and academic content curricula”.
Read MoreFor the past three years, I’ve taught a required graduate course on the Ethics of Sustainability in the Design for Social Innovation Program at the School of Visual Arts in NYC. During this time, I’ve witnessed the unintended results of educating about unsustainability. Although my students come from all over the world, they have at least a few things in common at the beginning of the year. These young people report feeling depressed, hopeless and guilty. Many of these students, believing they hold degrees in sustainability, have become experts in its opposite--unsustainability. They are nervous at first at the thought of discussing the ethics of sustainability. They tell me that their professors were very effective at pointing out that it’s too late, that we’ve already exceeded too many critical thresholds and that there is no way back. Game over?
My response to them is always the same, “I think what your professors have actually been saying is that they cannot imagine and they don’t know how we are going to pull off the mid-course correction that is required if we want human and other life to flourish on Earth indefinitely. I think this has more to do with their imaginations, mental maps and knowledge base than it does our fate.” Game on.
Read MoreThere are many options when it comes to designing curriculum that educates for sustainability. Some educators prefer to "sustainablize" their curriculum by working with the commencement edition of The Cloud Institute’s EfS Standards and Performance Indicators and cross walking and embedding them where and when appropriate. This also involves determining which ones are developmentally appropriate at each grade level. Others prefer we do that for them. If you would like to see how we would "sustainablize" our K-12 curriculum from the first quarter of Kindergarten to the last quarter of 12th grade, check out our new EfS Scope and Sequence.
Today we’d like to introduce you to Trevor Day School, a Pre-K through Grade 12 independent day school located in New York City. Trevor’s commitment to sustainability is evident inside and outside the classroom. Jaimie Cloud has been working with the school since 2009, providing training and resources to help the school integrate Education for Sustainability across grade levels and academic disciplines.
Read More
The Cloud Institute and The Derryfield School contributed to the newly released Educating for Sustainability: Case Studies from the Field, PreK-12. Jaimie Cloud and Brentnall M. Powell were two of the authors selected for the e-book, which showcases inspiring stories of Education for Sustainability (EFS) in action across the country. The case study, Inventing the Future: The Teaching of Environmental Studies, features Jaimie's work with Powell, the course instructor and Dean of Faculty and Academic Programs at The Derryfield School in Manchester NH. The two worked together to "sustainablize" Derryfield's year long, humanities based environmental studies course.
“When we were first growing the field of Education for Sustainability, all we had were aspirations,” states Jaimie. “Now we have case studies, research and student work as evidence. It is joyful work and it improves lives. Not bad.”
Educating for Sustainability: Case Studies from the Field, PreK-12 is a publication of Shelburne Farms, Shelburne, Vermont. Shelburne Farms is a nonprofit organization educating for a sustainable future. The Farm collaborates with educators, schools, and other partners to advance education for sustainability in Vermont, nationally, and internationally. Shelburne Farms’ campus for learning is a 1,400-acre working landscape and National Historic Landmark. Shelburne Farms serves over 150,000 program participants and visitors annually on-site alone.
To access the FREE e-book, Educating for Sustainability: Case Studies from the Field, PreK-12 please visit Shelburne Farms website.
Photo Credit: The Derryfield School: A digital poster made by a student as part of the Consumption/Waste/Design Unit.
This post, written by James Gast, was originally published on The Willow School website, 9/9/16.
“What kind of future do we want?” That’s the central question that Jaimie Cloud poses to educators and students.
As president of The Cloud Institute for Sustainability Education, Cloud has since 1993 worked with schools to “sustainable-ize” their curricula. It’s her contribution to the kind of future she wants – one where human beings thrive all over planet Earth, without undermining the fundamental support systems of Nature and Society.
On August 30 – 31, 2016, Cloud worked with Willow’s teachers to align elements of their curriculum with the “enduring understandings” associated with educating for sustainability and its nine core content standards: Cultural Preservation & Transformation; Responsible Local & Global Leadership; The Dynamics of Systems & Change; Sustainable Economics; Healthy Commons; Natural Laws & Ecological Principles; Inventing & Affecting the Future; Multiple Perspectives; and Strong Sense of Place.
Over the coming school year, Cloud will continue to consult with Willow and to coach faculty to deepen our understanding and delivery of sustainable education, and to more effectively document and map the curriculum as a whole.
“We had two goals in bringing Jaimie in this summer,” said Willow’s Head of School, Jerry Loewen. “One was to become more focused and more effective in our delivery of sustainability education. The other was to provide the entire faculty with a totally shared experience and totally shared definitions and expectations.”
The workshop marks Cloud’s third round of work with Willow in the last decade. Over that time, she has noticed a maturing of the school and a deepening sense of grounded-ness.
“I am glad to be back,” said Cloud, who collaborated closely with Loewen and Assistant Head of School Amy Swenson to customize her two 2-day workshop for Willow’s needs. “I look forward to working with Jerry, Amy and the faculty to build a regenerative curriculum to match the buildings!”
For Willow’s veteran teachers, the workshop offered a chance to more fully map their courses in relationship to one another, and to document what’s been working. For new hires, it was a chance to learn more about the Willow brand of education.
“Jaimie Cloud’s work on developing the whole child through a lens that appreciates the interconnectedness of all things is incredibly inspiring,” enthused Willow’s new third grade teacher Amy Arnold. “The EfS curriculum is just one more reason I am thrilled to be part of Willow. I cannot wait to see our students in action—working together toward their greatest purpose!”
Throughout the coming school year, teachers will document and map aspects of their curricula online. Cloud will serve as a coach, visiting Willow monthly to work with teacher-leaders as they embed appropriate knowledge, skills and dispositions of Education for Sustainability into exemplary curriculum units to share with their colleagues.
“The habits of mind we are developing for our students through these efforts are vital not only for them and their future, but for the broader community,” explained Loewen, “so we are examining ways to spread this work much more widely this year.”
The end goal of all this effort is to truly teach our students in ways that make them agents of effective and sustainable change for themselves, and ultimately for the world.
I have a confession to make. A ten year effort to help my community become sustainable has had limited success. Early enthusiastic progress, followed by a return to something resembling the status quo, has become a familiar pattern among the institutions in my town. Each experience starts with that same intoxicating esprit de corps, yet somehow, after the public’s attention shifts, things slowly end up fizzling out. This boom bust cycle leaves me wondering— if our local institutions can’t move beyond business as usual, how can we, as a society, ever hope to achieve a sustainable future?
Student-made Renewable Energy Machines Each school that Jaimie works with adopts Education for Sustainability (EFS) in a unique manner though there are specific conditions that support comprehensive and lasting change within the school community.
The Lovett School in Atlanta, GA has been working with The Cloud Institute for the past year. They recently partnered with Jaimie to determine the extent to which they were educating for sustainability. The school provided an extensive list of classroom activities and lessons (UbD Stage 3), which Jaimie then analyzed and annotated. This work and Jaimie’s recommendations are well documented in the Cloud Blog titled, “Is this Education for Sustainability?”. Additional information about their progress can be found in Lovett’s, Sustainability Program Annual Report .
While measurable data is the preferred method of assessment, anecdotal evidence can provide a window into the early impact of EFS on students and the school community. Beginning to see the fruits of their hard work, The Lovett School recently shared their observations with The Cloud Institute. These are particularly exciting as they support the growing empirical data documenting similar outcomes.
Teachers at Lovett reported the following changes since beginning their EFS journey:
Student Impact:
Teacher Impact:
We will continue to follow The Lovett School’s progress as they deepen their EFS work by developing a shared understanding of EFS and creating short and long term plans to systemically integrate and diffuse EFS throughout the school in a way that is documented, assessed, shared, integrated and improved over time.
Photo Credit: CCS Website
Today, we’d like to introduce you to Compass Charter School, a new progressive elementary school located in Brooklyn, NY. The school, which opened in 2014, currently offers kindergarten through second grade, but plans to serve children in grades K-5 at full capacity. Compass Charter School is the result of a 2012-13 journey by three Brooklyn teachers who traveled the nation in search of what is working well in the American education system. Brooke Peters, Michelle Healy, and Todd Sutler called their expedition The Odyssey Initiative (OI) and returned home to establish a school using lessons learned along the road. “ From our experience on the trip, we decided to start a new school that was progressive, inquiry based and one that connected with authentic experiences in the real world,” explains Healy. It soon became clear that a charter school was the best fit for the trio’s innovative philosophy, which required a departure from the traditional public school structure of leadership and budgeting.
A Mission is Born
Upon their return, the travelers noticedthat a number of the schools encountered on their journey were using Education for Sustainability (EfS) as a unifying framework and ultimately connected with The Cloud Institute. “It turned out that some of the schools we visited were partners with The Cloud Institute so we got to see the program firsthand and how they worked with Jaimie,” describes Healy. EfS seemed to connect many of the ideas the trio wanted to focus on for their new school. “We found that it brought everything together for us. We wanted it to be natural and have a social justice and economic side,” says Peters. “EfS helped us get the vocabulary and the framework. It lead us to Jaimie and the mission was born.”
The Road Map Emerges
Intrigued by the EfS standards, Healy and Peters first attended The Cloud Institute’s Summer Design Studio (SDS) in 2014. They immediately noticed the SDS was not a typical Professional Development (PD). “It really was a design studio,” says Healy. “Jaimie was there and flexible when we needed it, but she was also able to step out if we wanted to do some work designing.” The two spent the week exploring how to vertically align the EfS standards with K-5 curriculum and integrate Science and Social Studies standards in a meaningful way. “ Even though our school wasn’t approved yet, we just paid for the studio to help us develop what we wanted and where we wanted to go,” explains Healy. “We added very special foundational things, like overnight camping, a trip to see civil rights things and more, all depending on the units and years. That was the road map.” Another benefit of participating in the SDS was the opportunity to connect with others doing this work. “We also met some other people while we were there and we got to visit and learn from educators in NJ and other places. So it was a nice networking event as well, “ describes Peters. Once the school opened, the two returned to the SDS to work on unit design, this time accompanied by the school’s new Sustainability Coordinator, Kristen Beneke and a few founding faculty. Jaimie began monthly on-site coaching to support school leadership and faculty to help build the school, refine the units and focus on content skills and assessment. The team is planning to return to SDS this summer to continue to document and map their curriculum.
An Integrated EfS Curriculum
The Compass Charter School created a curriculum that aims to connect children with the natural world and the systems that sustain communities. Located in one of the most racially and culturally diverse places in New York City, the school takes advantage oflocal resources, such as people, green spaces, architecture and history. Sustainability is woven throughout the entire curriculum, including a twice weekly Sustainability Studio and ongoing classroom units at least three times a week. Teachers and staff meet every week to plan the integrated sustainability lessons. All curriculum is aligned with EfS standards as well as Common Core and Next Generation Science standards. In grades K-2, students immerse themselves in the natural world and begin scientific inquiry through play, exploration, and hands-on activities. Once grades 3-5 are added, students will participate in civic engagement by researching natural and built environments, and designing and implementing service projects within their own community.
Walking the Talk
At Compass Charter School, sustainability education doesn’t end at the classroom door. Green practices are implemented throughout the school such as vermiculture, composting, recycling and even CSA (community supported agriculture) shares distributed at the student-run farmer’s market in the schoolyard. Community members help to provide healthy snacks, cleaning products, and water bottles for the students. The classrooms at Compass offer natural environments that contain wood furniture, plants, and signs made by the students and teachers. Students transfer what they learn in the studio throughout their day at school and at home. Families donate recycled materials for arts and crafts projects and students recycle and reuse materials by transforming them into new objects. Everyday a student comes into school with a new object from nature that they must share or use as inspiration for a piece of writing about the Earth.
The Odyssey Continues
Creating a school from the ground up is as energizing as it is daunting. “We are riding the bicycle and building the bicycle at the same time,” explains Beneke. “It’s a challenge, but from it we will create something beautiful.” And they are not doing it alone. The Cloud Institute’s partnership has been vital to Compass Charter School’s early progress. “I don’t know where we would be without the dedicated assistance from The Cloud Institute. It’s the centerpiece.“ says Peters. ”EfS brings it all together.”
For more on Compass Charter School, visit their website.
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