{"id":11122,"date":"2018-11-26T17:13:03","date_gmt":"2018-11-27T01:13:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/?p=11122"},"modified":"2018-11-26T17:13:03","modified_gmt":"2018-11-27T01:13:03","slug":"more-than-30000-students-participate-in-inaugural-year-of-statewide-outdoor-school","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/2018\/11\/26\/more-than-30000-students-participate-in-inaugural-year-of-statewide-outdoor-school\/","title":{"rendered":"More than 30,000 students participate in inaugural year of statewide Outdoor School"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Three-quarters of Oregon\u2019s eligible fifth- and sixth-grade students participated in the inaugural year of the statewide Outdoor School program, according to a new Oregon State University Extension Service report.<\/p>\n<p>In the 2017-18 school year Oregon\u2019s 30,739 participating\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/extension.oregonstate.edu\/outdoor-school\">Outdoor School<\/a>\u00a0students spent a total of 115,131 days outside, according to the\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/oregonstate.app.box.com\/s\/c2k565f7uw2b2jzfkkqls6nmk6ttl7gj\">report<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Kristopher Elliott, an Oregon State University Extension Service assistant director who leads the program, anticipates those numbers will increase in in 2018-19. Eighteen new school districts applied for funding this school year, an increase of 14 percent.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/files\/2018\/11\/camptamarack51-for-web-e1543281058669.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone  wp-image-11123\" src=\"http:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/files\/2018\/11\/camptamarack51-for-web-300x141.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"600\" height=\"282\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe anticipate 42,456 students will attend Outdoor School this year, increasing the cumulative days spent outside to 167,126,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cWe are thrilled to see the increase in students, the number of new schools, and the increase in the total number of days Oregon students are learning outside.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Outdoor School has a long tradition in Oregon, with some programs dating back 50 years. But not everyone has had access to the program.<\/p>\n<p>That changed in November 2016, when Oregon voters passed Measure 99, mandating that all Oregon fifth- or sixth-grade students should have the opportunity to attend a week-long outdoor school program or comparable outdoor education program.<\/p>\n<p>Measure 99 created an Outdoor School Education Fund and mandated that Oregon State University Extension Service would support, administer, and fund an outdoor school program as set forth in Senate Bill 439, which approved $24 million for the program\u2019s first two years.<\/p>\n<p>According to the OSU Extension Outdoor School 2017-18 year in review:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Schools in all 36 Oregon counties participated<\/li>\n<li>128 of the state\u2019s 197 school districts received funding<\/li>\n<li>Of the 385 funded schools, 82 were offering Outdoor School for the first time<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Funded schools were required to report on Measure 99-specific learning outcomes and instructional strategies. Ninety-two percent reported that their Outdoor School program\u2019s curriculum and content significantly addressed science. Over 80 percent of the schools reported significant growth in their students\u2019 development of leadership, critical thinking, and decision-making skills.<\/p>\n<p>And 46 percent of the schools reported that they believed Outdoor School had a positive impact on their students\u2019 performance on the Oregon Assessment of Knowledge and Skills and Smarter Balanced standardized tests.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s reassuring to see\u00a0Outdoor\u00a0School\u00a0programs supported by Measure 99 funds are doing a good job of addressing the expected learning outcomes in Senate Bill 439,\u201d Elliott said. \u201cWe are committed to assisting individual programs and\u00a0schools in continuing to improve their learning outcomes over the next year.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The OSU Extension Outdoor School program has a comprehensive research agenda for 2018-19, Elliott said. That includes an analysis of Oregon Department of Education data to predict how many students may be eligible to attend Outdoor School in the next biennium and beyond.<\/p>\n<p>The team will more thoroughly analyze how to better serve students from low socioeconomic backgrounds, which will inform the program\u2019s outreach campaign targeted to schools with high numbers of students from historically marginalized groups. Consequently, Outdoor School has developed the 2018-19 outreach and inclusion plan to support better access to the program.<\/p>\n<p>The plan includes strategies for reaching out to families, communities and districts that aren\u2019t participating in Outdoor School and to work with them to identify solutions to their specific barriers.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cAs participation continues to increase, our team is focused on better supporting schools and providers in professional development, curriculum, and outreach to families who aren\u2019t yet participating,\u201d Elliott said.<\/p>\n<p>In the last year, Outdoor School has added a research, evaluation and assessment coordinator; an outreach and inclusion coordinator; a curriculum and professional development coordinator; and three regional coordinators to serve southern and eastern Oregon and the Portland metro area.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Story by: Chris Branam<\/p>\n<p>Source:\u00a0Kristopher Elliott<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Three-quarters of Oregon\u2019s eligible fifth- and sixth-grade students participated in the inaugural year of the statewide Outdoor School program, according to a new Oregon State University Extension Service report. In the 2017-18 school year Oregon\u2019s 30,739 participating\u00a0Outdoor School\u00a0students spent a total of 115,131 days outside, according to the\u00a0report. Kristopher Elliott, an Oregon State University Extension [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9071,"featured_media":11123,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11122","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11122","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/9071"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11122"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11122\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11124,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11122\/revisions\/11124"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11123"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11122"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11122"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.oregonstate.edu\/ecologue\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11122"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}