SCB - Conservation Education Talk

An abstract I submitted at the recently organized SCB by ATREE at Bangalore was accepted and I had an interesting experience attending the Conference. While the abstract was submitted under "Biodiversity and People" - one of the 4 themes of the Conference my talk was a part of a session titled "Conservation Management : Tools and Education". Pleased to share the abstract and select slides.

Conservation Education (CE): Questions enroute an invigorating journey.

CE program at Saiha (Mizoram) had me undertake a range of activities that include film-screenings, church-newsletters and tea-stall discussions. These were organized on a regular basis over a period of 3 years with different segments of society and efforts made to generate synergies with local practices. My involvement with the entire gamut from plan to documentation greatly enriched me and also left me with questions.  

Questions that range from whether we are communicating in an interesting enough fashion in the age of information overkill to if preaching helps and that too when many of us don’t practise what we preach and leave me perplexed. From perceiving conservation education as a corollary to wildlife research to debating the impact stand-alone events that talk of tigers to students in cities have! They lead me to believe that CE practitioners today need to critically look at conventional actions in context of the changing milieu!

I perceive CE as an opportunity to create and build on existing platforms to interact on conservation issues with different segments of the society. CE involves exploration, deliberation, negotiation and there is a dire need to bestow on it the time and efforts it merits. 

Many thanks to ATREE, SCB and Samrakshan Trust.