ICMM - International Council on Mining & Metals

CASE STUDY

Providing environmental education for a community's children

Background

Although Brazil is bestowed with a great diversity of animal and plant life, surveys and related scientific studies of its flora and fauna are rare in Brazil and confined to a relatively small number of regions and sites. People throughout the country – including schoolteachers and children – are generally unacquainted with local plant and wildlife. In fact, it is common for children to know more about African and Asian animals than Brazilian wildlife due to the influence of European and North American cultures. In the 1980s, environmental education in public schools was just being introduced to the curriculum, and there were few adequate teaching materials.

Alcoa saw an opportunity to contribute to environmental education in Brazil after it arranged for some surveys in connection with the rehabilitation of mined-out ore pits near the town of Poços de Caldas in the state of Minas Gerais. The company had been mining bauxite there since 1970 to supply ore for a mine-to-metal aluminium production facility. The town is 250 kilometres north of São Paulo and is Brazil’s most popular inland resort centre due to its beautiful mountain setting, cool climate and hot springs.

To support mine rehabilitation, which started in 1978, a plant survey was initiated by the State University of Campinas and a bird survey was done by an NGO from Curitiba, the Society of Wildlife Research. This group also held environmental education classes in a city park for youngsters during their summer vacations. The classes were such a success that Alcoa decided to extend environmental instruction to local schoolchildren on a permanent basis at a nearby centre to be built for that purpose.

Establishing the Centre

The Society of Wildlife Research planned the new venture. The Centro de Estudos e Pesquisas Ambientais – Alcoa (Alcoa Centre for Research and Studies on the Environment) was inaugurated in May 1993. It is located on an 18 hectare plot of land at an altitude of 1,400 metres, on an extension of the flanks of the 1,650 metre high mountain that overlooks the town.

Alcoa did not want to cut indigenous forest in order to build the centre, so three buildings went up in what had been a non-indigenous commercial forest, using 99 per cent eucalypt timber and boards. One building is administrative and two are for classrooms, with space for a nature-studies lab. The only significant original surface contour disturbance was space for vehicle parking. An adjacent native gallery forest and subtropical rainforest were left undisturbed except for the installation of three nature trails for instruction.

The centre’s main audience are children in the first eight years of the public school system. At the moment in this town of 150,000 there are 50 schools with this type of schooling – and 33,000 students.

Getting a Close Look at Nature

The Society of Wildlife Research designed and produced educational materials and trained the first team of environmental instructors. Today three instructors and an intern operate the centre under the direction of the Environment, Health and Safety Department at the nearby Alcoa plant. Instruction consists of interpretive observations on nature trails and classroom sessions with lectures and 16 instruction kits developed by the NGO.

The kits describe data on the regional wildlife population – its 245 bird, 46 mammal and 21 reptile or amphibian species – the physical aspects of the region and local environmental issues, including mining, tourism, garbage and wastes, use of agrotoxics in agriculture and human health. A number of general environmental topics are covered as well, such as soil, water, and air interrelationships; waste recycling; the five human body senses as perceived from nature’s elements; the organisation of living societies, such as bees; plant life; and Alcoa’s responsibility to the community to support the sustainability of land and nature. Instruction is designed so that if children return to the centre throughout their school years they are exposed to materials designed to fit their age group. Today this material complements classes given in the public school system.

Success in the Community

During the 11 years the centre has been open, 65,000 guests have visited the installation. The largest group by far has been local school youngsters – about 6,000 children a year. Each week six groups of 30–45 students and their science teachers spend three hours at the centre.

To extend the centre’s work into the community, courses on regional flora and fauna are given in the regular classrooms, children receive albums to paste pictures of birds in and a contest is held in which schools receive waste materials that students have to put together in some sort of art form. In addition, twice each year ‘Learning and Practising’ sessions are held for a number of local schools: posters and scale models of environment-related subjects are shown, and skits and dances are presented on the stage.

The Centro de Estudos e Pesquisas Ambientais – Alcoa has become the most popular school outing for children in Poços de Caldas. For many of them, it is the only chance they have to be out in nature.