Iranian Department of Environment Protection is developing a plan to incorporate environmental concepts in school curricula across the country in cooperation with the Ministry of Education.

 

In a joint memorandum signed by the Department of Environment and the Ministry of Education, 56 thousand teachers will be trained under supervision of the Department of Environment Protection and empowered to deliver the fundamental concepts of environmental protection in simple and attractive forms in schools all across the country.

 

According to Director of education and public participation of the environment department in the first phase of the project, 2000 teachers will be trained and given the role of environmental facilitators in country's schools.

 

The newly trained teachers will begin implementing the concepts in the elementary and middle schools at the beginning of the 2014 academic year. The project aims at increasing the ecological knowledge of students and communicating a sense of responsibility for the environment. This training includes the recognition of the natural and human environment, natural landscape of each province, unique features of Iran and Asia, degree of fragility of each ecosystem as well as appropriate modes of interaction with nature.

 

The project also promotes use of new forms of renewable energy, conservation of energy in schools and reduction of paper usage by encouraging use of electronic systems and the internet.