Professional Development

The Cloud Institute offers professional development to our primary audience:  K-12 educators and administrators. We also offer professional development to higher educator faculty, staff, and administrators interested in moving toward sustainability. Sessions can be delivered on-site, in conference centers, or in our green office in New York City.

Our professional development programs are rooted in EfS and focus on the following areas: Awareness, Skill Development, EfS Content, Curriculum Design, and Leadership. Examples of programs include our week-long Advanced Summer Institute on curriculum design and our New Jersey Learns Trainer of Trainer program on developing leadership skills.

Awareness Workshops

Introduction to Sustainability: A variety of interactive sessions provide participants with an awareness of sustainability and the application of the knowledge, skills and attitudes of Education for Sustainability (EfS), including core content and competencies of EfS. Workshop activities include systems thinking, quality of life indicators, common pool resources, economic models, and the ecological literacy skills of sustainability.

System Dynamics & Change: How can you, your faculty, and your students use systems thinking to address problems and design for continuous improvement over time. Introduces participants to systems thinking tools and habits of mind, as well as their application to sustainability, design, and change.

EfS Framework: Introduces participants to the 9 EfS Core Content Standards and how to apply the EfS framework to their curriculum and teaching.

Core Content and Habits of Mind: Introduces participants to the main core content areas of Education for Sustainability (EfS), as well as the habits of mind which EfS instills in students.

EfS Content Workshops

Cultural Preservation and Transformation: Introduces participants to the interdependence of sustainability to the preservation and transformation of cultural heritage, cultural identities, language, and practices.

Responsible Local/Global Citizenship: Introduces participants to the characteristics and processes of sustainable community initiatives through case study analysis, and helps participants understand the role of individuals and communities in leading and carrying out sustainable community initiatives.

System Dynamics & Change: Introduces participants to systems thinking tools and habits of mind, as well as their application to sustainability, design, and change (also an intro workshop).

Sustainable Economics: Introduces participants to ecological economics, a field that addresses the metric of interdependence between human economies and natural ecosystems. Participants will leave with the knowledge, skills and resources that will enable them to understand the connection of ecosystems, social systems and economic systems.
Life Cycle Analysis/Full Cost Accounting is covered in addition to exploration of the entrepreneurial mindset. This workshop is designed for educators, entrepreneurs, and consumers.

The Commons: Introduces participants to the “commons” in their own life and communities. Participants begin by exploring the differences between public and private property and understanding the concept of the commons, and then explore the characteristics of the commons and the various aspects of the commons in communities. Using this knowledge, participants explore their own communities and look for evidence of the commons.

Living within Ecological/Natural Laws & Principles: Introduces participants to science principles and natural laws that serve as “nature’s operating instructions” to guide and inspire us to live well within the means of nature.

Inventing and Affecting the Future: Teaches participants how to imagine, design, create, and eventually assess a desired future.

Multiple Perspectives & Mental Models: Introduces participants how to take different perspectives on an issue and our environment. Participants will learn the value of multiple perspectives gained from different life experiences and cultures, helping to close the gap between one’s mental models and the current reality.

A Sense of Place: Introduces participants to the value of the place in which they live, and how they are connected to it.

Sustainable Food Systems: Introduces participants to the root causes of hunger and develops informed opinions about their own food choices. Curriculum available.

Changing Consumption Patterns: Gives participants a thorough understanding of sustainability by connecting them with their own consumption patterns and exploring the connection between their consumption and world conditions. Curriculum available.

Biomimicry: Participants look at how nature can teach about design and address a specific design challenge. Specific solutions from designers in various fields will be covered.

Cradle to Cradle Design: Makes use of closed-loop systems. Participants are introduced to the design strategy, and then use the strategy to address a design challenge. Specific solutions from designers in various fields will be covered.

Skill Development Workshops

Assessments that Produce Learning: Attends to teachers’ need for diversified assessment to maximize students’ learning. It covers attributes of assessment, including using different types of assessment, designing and using authentic assessment, and helping students and teachers both understand achievement standards and use them to align curriculum, instruction, and assessment.

Sustainable Community Development Education: Introduces teachers to the content and tools needed to instruct their students on leadership and participation for a sustainable community development. Participants will learn how to lead a community exploration, guide students through an investigation of The Commons, facilitate a community visioning process, examine sustainable community case studies and begin to develop progress indicators.

Curriculum Design Workshops

Sustainable Design Education: Demonstrates how to use “place” (i.e. the community, the school building, an office, etc.) as curriculum by using different ways of knowing to investigate the places in which we live and study. Also introduces and applies sustainable design principles to initiatives on which participants are working.

Advanced Summer Institute: Curriculum Design Studio: Learn how to incorporate EfS into curriculum. In this 5 day workshop participants will have the time and space they crave, and the expertise, resources and tools they need to design elegant EfS curriculum units for use in their classrooms or design EfS change initiatives for their schools. Participants will also have the opportunity to learn how to use the Cloud Institute’s new on-line Curriculum Design Studio™, allowing them to design and share exemplary units.

Leadership Program

New Jersey Learns Trainer of Trainers Program: This program is designed to prepare educators, trainers and organizational/municipal/community leaders to introduce their constituents to sustainability and Education for Sustainability, and to develop a shared rationale for participating in the shift toward a sustainable future. Community based NJ Learns Leadership Teams participate in one year of introductory training, implementation, coaching and assessment activities. Applications are due in every February.


Full Courses of Study Workshops

Inventing the Future
Time: 4 days
Audience: 11-12 grade teachers
Topics: civics, democratic participation, community building, visioning
Methodology: peer-reviews, hands-on activities, guided practice
Required Materials: Inventing the Future course (included)

Business and Entrepreneurship
Time: 4 days
Audience: 11-12 grade teachers
Topics: entrepreneurship, sustainable economics, business models
Methodology: case studies, hands-on activities, guided practice
Required Materials: Business and Entrepreneurship for the 21st Century course (included)