News - Europe and Eurasia
Where you could see 180 happy faces? At GLOBE Learning Expedition in Estonia
GLOBE summer camp in Estonia is organized in August – a tradition that has stood since 1997. This year, however, was a little different even for us: in celebration of 20th anniversary of the program, GLOBE Estonia welcomed 180 participants (including guests from Latvia, Lithunia, Ukraine, Finland and Russia) at the Annual GLOBE Learning Expedition.
The first day everyone arrived to Nelijärve were greeted by the ambassador of the Embassy of the United States of America in Tallinn, Jeffrey D. Levine, and the Minister of Education and Science of the Republic of Estonia, Jürgen Ligi, and the director of the GLOBE Program, Tony Murphy. During the first day, Tony Murphy gave a presentation about history of the GLOBE Program, delegations of each participating country introduced GLOBE activities of their countries. The cultural activities' evening was lead by Bara Semerakova – the participants bonded over a variety of games and traditional dances, constant laughter and joy on their faces.
The focus of the second day was learning new skills and refreshing old ones. Participants learned about standard GLOBE protocols, how to measure data, how to send the data and how it all relates to the environment. Renowned NASA scientist Brian Campbell introduced the new SMAP protocol. The afternoon was for unwinding from all the studying. The pre-assigned groups worked together as a team in the GLOBE games, which included an array of minigames and tasks.
Expedition day – third day all groups were sent out on an expedition with a supervisor, each having a different set of objectives. They collected the data in the field, analyzed the results and prepared presentations about their expedition during the assigned time. The final evening was full of entertainment. Groups presented their role-plays/mini-movies about GLOBE, which was followed by disco/dance evening. Teachers spent a nice time at the traditional sauna evening.
The 4th and final day of GRLE2015 wrapped up the events of the past three days. Groups gathered for a final head-to-head quiz-battle about GLOBE, Nelijärve and things learned during the expedition. This was followed by presentations of the expeditions. The 4-day-event wrapped up with a feast and delicious cake.
By the end of the GRLE2015 there were 180 happy faces, we made new friends and formed new international bonds. Participants have shared warm thoughts about the event. Many have said they would do it all again in a heartbeat and hope for more future collaborations in the region. Rasmus, a GLOBE student, asked the organizing team for the opportunity to soon join the GLOBE Alumni team – an opportunity which he will surely be granted.
You can find the groups' presentations available at the website: http://www.globe.ee/GRLE2015/?page_id=65
Look at more photos and video!
The GLOBE Regional Learning Expedition 2015 was organized by GLOBE Estonia in cooperation with the Embassy of the United States of America in Tallinn and the Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Estonia.
type: globe-newsNews origin: Europe and Eurasia