The First Indoor Generation
When we think of teaching and learning, we likely conjure up images of a classroom filled with desks and whiteboards, where the teacher lectures from the front of a class filled with students dutifully listening and taking notes. On top of that, in an increasingly screen-oriented society, today’s children are at risk of becoming alienated from the natural world around them.
To explore this dynamic and how we think about contemporary education, join us for a conversation with Dr. Vera Michalchik, NatureBridge Vice-Chair of Education and Associate Director of Connected Learning Lab at UC Irvine and Dr. Wade Davis, described by academic and environmental activist David Suzuki as “a rare combination of scientist, scholar, poet and passionate defender of all of life’s diversity.”
Our Speakers
Wade Davis #
Wade Davis is a writer, photographer, and filmmaker whose work has taken him from the Amazon to Tibet, Africa to Australia, Polynesia to the Arctic. Explorer-in-Residence at the National Geographic Society from 2000 to 2013, he is currently Professor of Anthropology and the BC Leadership Chair in Cultures and Ecosystems at Risk at the University of British Columbia.
Author of 23 books, including One River, The Wayfinders and Into the Silence, winner of the 2012 Samuel Johnson prize, the top nonfiction prize in the English language, he holds degrees in anthropology and biology and received his Ph.D. in ethnobotany, all from Harvard University. His many film credits include Light at the Edge of the World, an eight-hour documentary series written and produced for the NGS. Davis, one of 20 Honorary Members of the Explorers Club, is the recipient of 12 honorary degrees, as well as the 2009 Gold Medal from the Royal Canadian Geographical Society, the 2011 Explorers Medal, the 2012 David Fairchild Medal for botanical exploration, the 2015 Centennial Medal of Harvard University, the 2017 Roy Chapman Andrews Society’s Distinguished Explorer Award, the 2017 Sir Christopher Ondaatje Medal for Exploration and the 2018 Mungo Park Medal from the Royal Scottish Geographical Society. In 2016, he was made a Member of the Order of Canada. In 2018 he became an Honorary Citizen of Colombia. His latest book is Magdalena: River of Dreams, Knopf, 2020.
Vera Michalchik #
Vera Michalchik conducts research at the Connected Learning Lab, Dept. of Informatics, UC Irvine. She studies learning in its many forms and settings—including community, school, home, online and workplace environments—through work funded by federal agencies such as NSF and numerous private foundations. She has also contributed to several National Academies studies on science learning and been an advisor to program developers and educational institutions worldwide. She previously led projects in research, evaluation and design at SRI Int’l, Stanford University and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation and holds her Ph.D. from Stanford, master's from Harvard and B.A. from UC Berkeley.
Stephanie Tedy, Bank of the West #
Stephanie Tedy is the VP, Head of Strategic Philanthropy at Bank of the West, one of our 50th Anniversary sponsors.
Stephanie joined Bank Of The West in March 2010, as a Branch Manager of the Westminster Sheridan office in Colorado, and transitioned into Community Affairs in 2015. She has always had a heart for serving in her community, by volunteering as a mentor for unemployed women, a financial literacy coach to low income kids, and now serves as the Board President of Community Resources and Housing Development Corporation.
She lives in Thornton, Colorado with her husband and 4 year old daughter, Avery.
50th Anniversary Sponsors
