MARTHA C. MONROE

Assistant Professor, Natural Resources Education and Extension

Martha Monroe is responsible for environmental education extension activities and teaches courses on related topics. Her specialty is the development and evaluation of education and outreach programs that support conservation behavior and sustainable systems.

• Natural Resource Education for Youth

Faculty and students work with formal and non-formal educators to develop appropriate educational programs and to assess their value.
• 4-H Project Books - Three new 4-H Project Books have been developed for individual youth and 4-H clubs to explore Florida?s Forest Resources. Teachers will find the activities will help supplement national curriculum with a Florida-specific flare. The books are:
• Adopt a Tree
• Trees and Me
• Florida?s Fabulous Forests

• 4-H Forest Ecology Contest - A contest for 4-H youth to identify trees and other forest organisms is held every year. Support information to assist youth in learning about Florida?s forests can be found on the website: www.sfrc.ufl.edu/4h . Information about this year?s contest is located at the 4-H site. Funding for the Forest Ecology website was provided by the UF 4-H Foundation.
• Give Forests a Hand - Several students have been involved with developing this middle school environmental service learning program that is adapted from Give Water a Hand. Youth groups explore trees and forests in an urban or rural context and identify projects that could enhance their community. Working with local resource partners and their leader, the youth go through a process of researching their topic, assessing possible futures, planning an action project, and conducting their service. Reflection questions at each step help reinforce the learning process. Several leader workshops and a formative evaluation of this program will be conducted in 2001-2. Funding to support this program has come from CSREES, US Fish and Wildlife Service, School of Forest Resources and Conservation, and College of Natural Resources and Environment.
• Project Learning Tree - An evaluation of teacher?s use of PLT in Florida was conducted for the Florida PLT Steering Committee. Interviews, focus groups, and mail surveys found that 75% of those who are trained to use PLT use it with youth, and 75% of these educators have used PLT in the classroom in the last two years. Most teachers use less than 6 activities per year in the classroom or on school grounds. They believe that the Florida Sunshine State Standards (SSS) and the Florida Comprehensive Assessment Test (FCAT) reduced their use of PLT. In response to this research, the Florida PLT Steering Committee is expanding their guide to using PLT to meet the Sunshine State Standards and are restructuring workshops to demonstrate how PLT activities can help students prepare for assessment tests. Funding was from the Florida Forestry Association and the School of Forest Resources and Conservation.
• Extension Publications:
• Kids in the Woods
• Trees in Your Life

• Environmental Education Professional Development

Faculty and students explore innovative ways to help formal and nonformal educators improve their current teaching practices and learn new skills in environmental education.
• Tracking Outreach Success in the US Fish and Wildlife Service - Outreach is an important component of successful resource management projects. Working with the US Fish and Wildlife Service through the National Conservation Training Center, we are assembling 50 case studies of outreach activities for use in training courses. Extensive scenarios for classroom use will also be developed. Funding is from US Fish and Wildlife Service.
• Program Evaluation - Evaluating environmental education programs is an important element of creating and supporting high quality programs. A series of workshops and courses have been conducted over several years to enable educators and agency staff build the skills to develop their own program evaluations. A current project is to enhance evaluation of Forestry Extension Programs, including Master Tree Farmer, Wildland Fire, and Forest Stewardship.
• State Committee on Environmental Education (SCENE) - The Florida state agencies meet several times a year to exchange information about their environmental education efforts. We updated and produced a Directory of materials produced by these agencies for teachers in Florida. Copies of the Directory are available in County Extension Offices, at the School of Forest Resources and Conservation, and on the web at: http://www.sfrc.ufl.edu/Extension/scene.htm.
• Environmental Education Institute - This 3-day inservice training for extension agents will introduce participants to environmental education program resources, natural resource issues, and many of the programs available in Extension and Florida to educate youth. Sessions will be led by specialists from the School of Forest Resources and Conservation, Wildlife Ecology and Conservation, Fisheries and Aquatic Sciences, Florida Sea Grant, and Youth, Family, and Consumer Sciences. This inservice will first be held in October 2001 and may be repeated. Funding is from SFRC, Florida Division of Forestry, Center for Natural Resources/IFAS, and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation.
• Extension Publications:
• Just Say YES to Youth Environmental Stewardship
• Enhancing Natural Resource Programs with Service Learning
• Career and Internship Possibilities in Natural Resources
• State and Federal Agencies Supporting Youth Environmental Stewardship
• SCENE Directory
• Reforming Education with Environmental Education

• Wildland Fire Education

• Wildland Fire Education Toolkit - This award-winning program provided program tools for extension agents and Division of Forestry staff to conduct public programs in high-risk communities about wildland fire, develop demonstration sites for prescribed fire and firesafe landscapes, and increase press coverage of wild and prescribed fire. A recent survey was conducted to explore barrier and motivations for using these materials in public programs.
• Extension Publications:
• Designing Demonstration Areas
• Developing Lands in Florida
• Landscaping in Florida with Fire in Mind
• Air Quality and Prescribed Fire