Education at ACES

for challenges. Educators saw themselves in Kelly’s work, and continue to cherish this meaningful experience. Tiny interactions, like this training with Kelly, inspire me.

Getting to know people is the best part of what I do as the School Programs Manager at ACES.

Understanding, Belonging & Flourishing in ACES Ed

by Kamille Winslow School Programs Manager

“You are the key to a calm and respectful classroom,” said Kelly Lord, the guidance counselor at Kathryn Senor Elementary in New Castle, when ACES Educators entered the Innovation Station at school for a training on classroom management. Her playful personality sparked educators’ engagement with tips and tricks for “firm expectations and flexible responses” in the classroom. She gracefully modeled how to explore feelings, transitions, and power throughout a class. Educators felt understood and heard her compassion

As the supervisor of ACES Educators, I get to ask: How well do I know what is important for them to grow, change, mature, and shift priorities? I’ve learned that educators’ courage, needs, skills, and vulnerability fluctuate with cultural norms in the workplace, classroom, outside, and in the broader community. Every individual has a story, and I want to know their lived experiences.

ACES environmental education programs seek to understand lived experiences, too. In ACES classrooms, we navigate interpersonal growth and solve environmental mysteries. As learning experiences are explained by students, educators respond with empathy for the many dimensions about a situation we could otherwise not fully know or assume. The management of interpersonal relationships in classrooms, the field, and the workplace is the hardest part of educators’ inherently social jobs. And yet, building relationships with people is the most meaningful reward in education.

As teachers, ACES Educators learn to be open about what is important for students to understand while letting their own impressions and opinions evolve with new information, too.

Ultimately, it is our responsibility to demonstrate inquiry for students. We want others to agree with us, but we also benefit when others can frame experiences in a new way. Reframing is valuable because it affects how we think and behave as citizens. ACES Ed programs serve as a bridge between social-emotional learning in nature and environmental literacy skills in life. When we pay attention to inspiring an engaged citizenry, we stay connected to what ACES Ed does best – giving educators and students agency and a community feeling.

This year, we chose new team norms to influence the tiny interactions we have in the office, at school, and in nature. The ACES Education team is supportive, honest, collaborative, considerate, positive, and trustworthy. After months of practicing our Ed Team norms, camaraderie is present. We are experiencing the benefits of ongoing conversations, listening, following up, and collaborative decision-making for a shared story, which, I think, is inspiring a sense of belonging and resilience.

When you feel like you belong, the essential, emotional need to be accepted is met, and you think, “It is okay for me to be here.” Cultural norms and a sense of belonging will be increasingly important for ACES Ed because both maximize individuality, acceptance, and coherence in an effort to influence the next generation of environmental stewards. We are learning to continuously edit our beliefs about what to do, because they inform our presence. After all, it is an educator’s human presence—demeanor, volume, and language—that affects how young people lead their lives in natural and human-built environments.

In my four years at ACES, I’ve observed that exposure to new emotional, social, and intellectual experiences with place, people, skills, and knowledge changes lives. Supervisor-educator, school staff educator, and educatorstudent relationships in ACES Ed serve self-discovery, innate curiosity, lifelong learning, and environmental service in local and regional communities. In the future, I intend to deepen the sense of belonging on our team and in our programs because it supports self-acceptance and the desire to be part of something bigger than ourselves.

We get to bring back the pleasure in education. The pleasure of getting to know oneself and others. We get to know the joy of curiosity. We get to inspire a legacy of belonging in environmental education with responsiveness, empathy, grit, and responsibility. 

The text translates to “And you, too, can do it. I know that learning a new language and way of life is hard. But with perseverance and help, you will do it. And then you’ll be more powerful, just like me.” of field programs we can offer to schools. We are continuing to add and refine field programs for the Re–2 School District including programs at East Elk Creek, Rifle Falls, Sunlight Mountain, and the Silt River Preserve. Additionally, six members of our education team supported Basalt High School experiential education trips in the fall.

Now he bounces on his toes, chats with his friends, and he looks me in the eye, ready to learn with a sense of belonging in the ACES classroom.