Ecological Education Experiences and Discoveries. Towards 3rd World Education

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Ecological Education Experiences and Discoveries. Towards 3rd World Education

Cape Verde
Organization type: 
nonprofit/ngo/citizen sector
Budget: 
< $1,000
Website:
http://www.dive-macaronesia.eu
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Project Summary
Elevator Pitch

Concise Summary: Help us pitch this solution! Provide an explanation within 3-4 short sentences.

The work that is principally undertaken is to educate and
sensibilize all ages to the importance of the natural world through
ecologically based experiences...the speciality is the marine world but this
also includes the inter-tidal zones and the presentation of facts that
relate to land based contaminations that affect the quality of the marine
life

About You
Organization:
Project Macaronesia
Visit website
Section 1: About You
First Name

Nigel

Last Name

Collingwood

Website

http:// www.dive-macaronesia.eu

Country
Section 2: About Your Organization
Is your initiative connected to an established organization?

Organization Name

Project Macaronesia

Organization Phone

0034690162439

Organization Address
Organization Country
How long has this organization been operating?

Less than a year

Your idea
Country your work focuses on
Innovation
What makes your innovation unique?

The project is clearly in all the above that you have asked me and in simple
terms it is one that intends to educate and sensibilize people of really all
ages about the importance of the natural world and how we depend upon it for
our survival and how we are destroying and contaminating it for an excessive
consumption. This I bring to those who participate with practical and visual
experiences in 3 different languages and with a certain 'British' humour
which adds a dimension of getting interest and response from an audience.
One also takes people on valuable real-life experiences such as snorkel &
scuba activities as well as treks into terrestrial ecology. Its semi
scientific but always in the common language.
The uniqueness of any experience is always found by the participant - what
we offer is the playing field and the means thereof - we can take people to
a never before visited location and find seldom seen species. Equally we can
go to a common place and show how to discover secrets that are there but are
not necessarily observed by the untrained eye. Its like the "barren" desert
that has so much life. For those of 3rd world areas we bring materials and
awareness for them to awaken and self discover.

Do you have a patent for this idea?

Impact
Tell us about the social impact of your innovation. Please include both numbers and stories as evidence of this impact

Everything is relative and experiences are contrived by methods that bring
the individual to a hands-on, face-to-face experience. Success is a word
that should begin with "failure is never having started and success is
relative to the investment of time, energy and interest. Sustainability is
also relative and has no continuity in human action...passing experiences
that linger a life time are those which are fond to the memory of the
individual. Negative impacts are zero focused...minimised impacts are
possible.
The idea or subject matter should be simple and it is the detail that
produces the impact of the class or open air experience..this is should not
be complicated as there is also the intention to derive maximum benefit
through absorption of content by the individual . The approach is made
through a process of adaptation to an audience from a spinal
programme...where there are age differences and language differences...this
adaptability is a pre-requisite of nature and thus it is educatively applied
in the classroom or open air class...and thus to 3rd world children who have
meagre access to IT or even paper/books/pencils.

Problem: Describe the primary problem(s) that your innovation is addressing

Financation for equipment

Actions: Describe the steps that you are taking to make your innovation a success. Include a description of the business model. What might prevent that success?

To open windows on experiences not yet realized or the result of a previous
affair...underlined by the accuracy of the localities and history there-of.
Enthusiasm is something that often has to be engendered by an honest
presentation indicating clearly the participants approach of pleasure
through learning. A walk has a begining a middle and an end and everything
relevant along that walk is opened to the participant. It is not solely
leading the participants it is involving them by stimulating their interest.

Bringing different people together with differing values helps open the
forum of exchange and consequent learning - in this area one is very
succesful and also very creative. Finally the newly found friends enthuse
over their discoveries and or differences but almost entirely in modus
positivus.

Results: Describe the expected results of these actions over the next three years. Please address each year separately, if possible

In this work one is also involved with an ONG that has environmental issues
involved with volunteers...there is also good 'press' empathy for the work
which alerts people to the issues and creates another level of awareness.
This is in Spanish and English...visitors return to us or make
recommendations. The forum is mobile, transient but interested...awakenings
are effective and well recieved - the benefits of my work for others is that
I am repeatedly asked to participate.

How many people will your project serve annually?

What is the average monthly household income in your target community, in US Dollars?

Less than $50

Does your innovation seek to have an impact on public policy?

Yes

If your innovation seeks to impact public policy, how?

Public policy has already been made – our impact will be for the recipients and their education/pleasure/consciousness.

Sustainability
What stage is your Social Enterprise in?

Operating for more than 5 years

Does your organization have a board of directors or an advisory board?

Does your organization have a non monetary partnerships with NGOs?

Does your organization have a non monetary partnerships with businesses?

Does your organization have a non monetary partnerships with government?

Please tell us more about how partnerships could be critical to the success of your Social Enterprise

Approximately 250 words left (1200 characters).

We would like to learn more about how your initiative is financially supported. Please explain your business plan/revenue model

Shoe-strings and a little input from the local council to cover costs for
educative projects to the local schools...where-in the enclosed photo shows
myself presenting the project at an adult reunion on the marine biodiversity
off the coast of Antigua. It is also self financed from my teachings...the
foundation is that from little acorns big trees grow...equally, less is
more.
It is sustained by a financial process and everything is
relative to the input. One works for peanuts because the issue is important
and overcoming local lethargy is luck wrestling in mud or trying to push a
double-decker on your own. But in between Mohammed and the mountain is a lot
of viable space.

The Story
What was the defining moment that led you to this innovation?

The origen is based in the individuality and importance of understanding
that political dogmas did not invent nor sustain the magnificence of our
natural world, and, whilst greater men/women than I may well have trodden
this path there is truth in that the path trodden has been narrow and not
wide enough to reach the many who would like experiences but that these are
not accessible enough. We all play roles and mine is to reach further into
the wilderness and bring some of the ecological wonders to a practical
encounter in forums of those who seek or need persuasion on the
attainability of doing essentially simple things that one can derive
pleasure, entertainment and education or learning from such to better
understand on matters environmental. All this helps those who will not have
such a chance to know.

Tell us about the person—the social innovator—behind this idea.

I was born too late to be a great explorer in Africa and too early to be a
spaceman - but I learned that I was an explorer of innerspace the underwater
realm and there I make discoveries and help others to do the same - I am a
very succesful scuba instructor/marine photographer. I am also an educator
in environmental issues and marine ecologist. I spend a lot of personal and
voluntary time to educate kids and adults with both photagraphic and
powerpoint presentations on the importance of the ecology of our world.
There are those that will not have this opportunity if it isnt taken to
them, thus, I want to bring some of it to them from all my years of
experience. I was born in Brazil, currently live in the Canary Ils and have
3 strong languages. I am a Brazil football fan and support Real Madrid and
Liverpool. I am currently in exhibition with "Manatura II"Secrets of the
Marine World. Currently WE are 6 people looking to realize this project.

How did you first hear about Changemakers?

Newsletter from Changemakers

If through another source, please provide the information