What kind of user are you?

The strength of OBIS lies within the diversity of its users. Thus we will be creating specialized pages for each major interest group that we expect to have visiting this site. We anticipate each of these groups will have specific questions and insights that will better suit this particular audience.

To begin, we have delineated between formal and informal education uses for OBIS:

This group is mainly for classroom teachers but can also include science specialists or coordinators. These users face the challenges of taking the classroom outdoors, amid the restraints of formal education systems and politics. The pressures on teachers have changed dramatically since OBIS was born and they need to be addressed in order to successfully create an experience that works for you. In addition to using the outdoors to enhance learning, we will explore what role formal education will/should play in reconnecting children to nature.

We called this group community educators in hopes of including the diverse world of educators outside the classroom. There is an essential world of life enrichment that exists outside the constraints of the traditional classroom. This group is for free choice educators, nature/EE center instructors, after school program and scout troop leaders, directors and coordinators (who may have began their careers teaching OBIS), and parents looking for an enriching activity for the family. The wealth of perspective, enthusiasm and experience that you all bring to the table will be invaluable as we move forward with the revision as well as larger questions of effectively reconnecting youth to their natural world of their place.