Forest schools join forces for new national body
Melanie Defries
Tuesday, May 24, 2011
A membership organisation is to be set up for forest schools following a consultation carried out by the Institute for Outdoor Learning (IOL) Special Interest Group for Forest Schools and supported by the Ernest Cook Trust.
The Forest School National Governing Body, which will be launched in the early part of 2012, aims to provide a quality assurance scheme for forest schools as well as a national database of the settings and websites where practitioners and training providers can access and share resources. It eventually aims to develop new level 3 and 4 qualifications for forest school practitioners.
Erica Wellings, development officer for the governing body, which is being funded by the IOL and the Ernest Cook Trust, said, 'For part of the consultation we sent out a questionnaire last year to forest school providers and practitioners, and 85 per cent said that there should be a governing and/or representative body.
I am now visiting forest schools and meeting with providers face to face to carry out further research on what they actually want from a membership organisation. So far, most people said that they want an umbrella organisation that links with Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales, and that provides somewhere for practitioners to share good practice and gets good leverage for forest schools.'
She added, 'There are around 4,000 forest schools in the UK and no-one is currently representing them at a national level. Only Wales has a network established, as this has been supported by the Welsh Assembly.
'The ethos behind forest schools is very similar to that of other organisations such as Steiner and Montessori, but they have huge followings and membership organisations. Forest schools are still under the radar. There are also regional inequalities whereas some areas have lots of forest schools, but in other areas they have not yet taken off.'
The Forest School National Governing Body will also aim to raise awareness about the settings among parents, schools and landowners.
Ms Wellings said, 'We would like to have an information site for parents so that they can see the sort of things their children will be doing in a forest school.'
Practitioners are invited to contact Ms Wellings at erica.w@outdoor-learning.org to give feedback on what services they would like the governing body to provide.
