The EEON Strategic Planning Process

The goal of the planning process, which resulted in this document, was to be broad-based and inclusive. In October of 2002 EEON held its first public strategic planning session. Over 100 people attended a two-day event at the Mono Cliffs Outdoor Education Centre near Orangeville, Ontario. Additional input to the plan was gathered from participants who completed EEON’s “Strategizing for the Future” workbook. By the end of the public consultation, nearly 300 hard copy and electronic workbooks were received. The planning process included input from representatives of educational, professional, governmental, and citizens’ groups, as well as from individuals.

All participants at the Mono Cliffs event were invited to join in developing environmental and sustainability education outcomes, needs, and strategies for any of the seventeen designated educational audiences, which represent core sectors of society. Each section of the plan is addressed to actual and potential E&SE providers and supporters who serve the members of a designated audience.

Following the first stage of public strategic planning, the material gathered for each audience sector was summarized into a template format, and edited by an outside reviewer with a particular interest in each of the sectors. Drafts were then returned to Environmental Education Ontario for internal editorial review before being posted on the EEON website for public comment.

A second public event—this time a one-day, follow-up planning session—took place in April 2003 at the Forest Valley Outdoor Education Centre in Toronto. Over seventy participants worked to refine strategies, identify common strategies and goals across audiences, and begin to design a process for putting selected strategies into action.

Audience drafts were revised on the basis of on-line comments, and input from the second planning round were posted on EEON’s website for another period of public review and comment. In June of 2003 the public comment period was closed, and the editing of the complete document began. The fall of 2003 was set for the public launch of the completed strategic planning document, Greening the Way Ontario Learns.