The OSU study: Guiding our learning principles into the future

Supported by the Foundation in its final two years, the UWCSEA collaborative study with Oregon State University is heading into its last year in 2023/2024. The study began in 2015/16, and was designed to look at the long-term, incremental impact of UWCSEA’s Outdoor Education (OED) on UWCSEA’s Learning Programme and the skills and qualities we seek to develop in our students. It also seeks to measure the influence of OED on wellbeing characteristics such as grit, and connection with nature.

This year felt a particular buzz of activity as Outdoor Education programming saw a return post-pandemic. As Oli Sampson, Head of OED Dover reported at the start of this year, “We are excited to be returning to offering the sorts of programmes that Outdoor Education at UWCSEA is known for. We are supporting students to have experiences that develop skills, challenge, and build them up to be connected to themselves, each other, and most importantly to the natural world.”

Researchers Mike and Chris were also excited to get back to the trips, joining the Grade 9 students in Tioman. As Mike reflected,

Measuring [OED] post Covid will definitely have an impact. It’s going to take some time to re-capture the Covid lost years, not only because of the disconnect to these trips over time, but also from the side of recapturing expectations around student learning.” For this, Chris was quick to add that no matter the change due to the pandemic years, it was great to be able to get students back in nature: “You can’t be serious about sustainability unless you realise you live on planet earth – so it’s great to be back out there to see the
beauty in nature which is really important for the kids ... they need to learn again about the natural world and to start
thinking about it.

The Foundation looks forward to bringing you highlights from the final year of the OSU longitudinal study next year. For those who may have missed it, we invite you to read the “Stepping Stones to the Great Outdoors” article published in the December 2022 issue of Dunia, which shares insights OED from the student perspective.