Conservation Education & Citizen Science

LF has been the major conservation education player in the Laikipia landscape for over 15 years. Laikipia’s schools and pupils have benefitted from learning excursions supported by donors during this time. The model was highly valued, but not sustainable.

Access to information and education remains a cornerstone of conservation work, and the Forum has supported others and their activities – the Northern Kenya Conservation Clubs, the Northern Kenya Conservation Education Working Group, and others.

In order to increase the impacts of these clubs and working groups, the Forum has supported a landscape level association of conservation educators – the Laikipia Association of Conservation Educators (LACE).

LACE allows conservation education educators to benefit from materials and activities at scale. It supports the interaction of educators, allows members access to materials, expertise, and programs, and provides a forum from which fundraising, international/regional partnerships, and expertise can be accessed.

Citizen Science is a more recent addition to the Forum’s programs (5 years) and is exciting public engagement in conservation and natural resources management research.

Our Goal

To make the greater Laikipia landscape a premiere, sustainable conservation education and learning destination supporting formal and non-formal education, and citizen science.

“Welcome to Wild Class. Welcome to Laikipia!”

Purpose

To provide Laikipia conservancies with services that support the development of conservation education as a sustainable enterprise and viable land use. Moreover, the WILD CLASS program should become a financially viable and sustainable model for area schools to enjoy the same class of conservation education programs.

LF and Jacaranda Africa have embarked on an initiative to turn Conservation Education in Laikipia into a sustainable, income generating activity, and land use for ranches and conservancies.

This conservation education effort is designed to accomplish three objectives:

Encourage development of Conservation Education as a profitable income generating activity for Laikipia conservancies.
Demonstrate the effectiveness of conservation education as a land use in Laikipia.
Subsidise the offering of Conservation Education to local schools in Laikipia.

To advance Laikipia as a conservation education learning destination, Jacaranda Africa and LF have developed a sustainable Conservation Education strategy; thus pushing the limits on what has always been a heavily subsidised program in Laikipia.

This conservation education effort is designed to accomplish three objectives:

Encourage development of Conservation Education as a profitable income generating activity for Laikipia conservancies.
Demonstrate the effectiveness of conservation education as a land use in Laikipia.
Subsidize conservation education to local schools in Laikipia.

WILD CLASS is a collective effort of wildlife conservation education destinations in the greater Laikipia landscape.

Each WILD CLASS destination offers the potential to develop into a world-class facility offering progressive conservation education learning to Kenya’s middle-class youth.

WILD CLASS offers conservancies an additional income generating activity.

Each WILD CLASS visitor provides the potential to sponsor a similar visit by a pupil from an area school.

Each WILD CLASS destination features a special or unique offering about nature, land use, and conservation management in the landscape. These features have been captured on film as part of our WILD CLASS development and promotion.

We are joined by these 10 Conservation Education learning destinations in Laikipia to develop the concept of “WILD CLASS”.

Laikipia Association of Conservation Educators (LACE)

Wild Class is the brand that will accompany our conservation education enterprise efforts.

LACE is the mechanism by which conservation education is delivered through a unified approach, throughout the Laikipia landscape, that benefits all conservancies and advances conservation through education for behavior change.

Through WILD CLASS, the Association pursues a model that includes services needed to develop conservation education as an enterprise. The dimensions of these services include:

Sales and Marketing
Conservation Program Development
Business Planning
Capacity Building among Conservation Education Staff
Financing
Monitoring and Evaluation

CITIZEN SCIENCE

Citizen Science or “crowd” science is all about growing the role of public participation in scientific research. It is the next important step in demystifying scientific research, engaging people in the process of scientific investigations, and pulling them into asking questions, collecting data and its interpretation, and sharing the results.

Significant parts of the greater Laikipia landscape have embarked on a mission to be Kenya’s very own Citizen Science destination. We want residents and visitors alike to share in the science of discovery and to engage with us in asking questions that will focus our future efforts, both for scientific investigation and management of these key, unique territories and their resources. The essence of Citizen Science is that volunteers collect and share data (information) that can be analyzed by scientists and citizen participants.

This information then becomes rich material for public feedback, wider public information sharing, lobbying, advocacy, funding and the development of new projects. In essence, we’re increasingly talking about the “democratization” of science, scientific funding, and the use of scientific results.

The Great Grevy’s Rally was the first important step in this process. This scientifically supervised engagement of the public yielded the first, complete census of the endangered Grevy’s Zebra in Kenya. It has since informed additional rallies, discussions, and scientific research for the conservation of Grevy’s Zebras.

Oppuntia stricta, “prickly pear” management and control is another example of citizen engagement in invasive species mapping and control. Using Apps, smart phones and local knowledge, Laikipia residents are contributing to the management of the invasive cactus in the landscape.

The “citizen science” approach to learning is one way that Laikipia Forum aims to promote Laikipia as a safe and fun learning environment for all. In keeping with its Wild Class program for conservation education, LF believes that Laikipia is a perfect ‘natural classroom’ because of its high concentration of research activities, learning opportunities, and conservation challenges, as well as its unique local communities committed to conserving them.

5 –Year Objectives
- Nurture and support the membership, operations and management of LACE
- Secure funding for the operations of LACE and its secretariat
- Secure the funding to operationalize WildClass
- Secure more opportunities to engage Kenyans in the science of conservation.

Activities

Role of the FORUM

Partnerships

Key partnerships working to support these theme are the GZT, MRC, Princeton, NRT, RCMRD, Laikipia County, LCA, all the logos from the LACE members,