Education has been identified as a priority area by the Chiloé Model Forest Partnership. Schools in Chiloé are  strongly rooted in the community life and their programs could help improve the households’ productive activities.

The Chiloé Model Forest wishes to work with schools and the teaching community to promote and develop curricula and activities which would integrate formal education subjects with environmental and sustainable management issues. This would also help the model forest raise awareness in Chiloé of sustainable forest management issues and  spur on innovative community-driven ideas for the wise use and conservation of the island’s natural resources.

The Chiloé Model Forest is looking to Canada to learn from the experience of Canadian model forests and other organizations. With the assistance of the IMFNS and the Canadian Model Forest Network Secretariat, they have collected information on model forest projects dealing with education.  In March 1999, Adriana Hoffman and Martin Cox, from the Chiloé Model Forest, visited Sussex, New Brunswick, to discuss environmental education with partners of the Fundy Model Forest. As follow-up, a Chilean delegation of teachers and municipal education officers will return to Canada in mid-September 1999. The activities planned for this mission include:

• participation in the Fundy Teachers Seminar,
• examination of  Eastern Ontario Model Forest’s efforts in education, and
• visits to other Canadian institutions involved in environmental education.

This work and other Canadian-Chiloé MF linkages are being supported under a CIDA Cone Fund Project which is administered by the IMFNS.