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Expeditionary education


Expeditionary education is often associated with adventure education, outdoor education, environmental education, or experiential education and refers specifically to learning associated with exploration and journey-based experiences or expeditions within these fields. Usually involving elements of challenge, adventure, and leadership, expeditionary education can take place in a variety of settings including wilderness, classrooms, and even virtual spaces (the internet). Participants in expeditionary education can be directly involved in the expedition, or may be linked to expeditions undertaken by others.

Webster's online dictionary defines expeditionary as "of, relating to, or being an expedition." Expeditionary education is of, relating to, or being an expedition within an educational framework. Expeditionary education may be mistakenly defined as a subset of or synonymous to outdoor education, adventure education, or experiential education. While many expeditionary education programs of, or being an expedition could be defined under these existing fields (such as Outward Bound, or NOLS), educational programs relating to expeditions may take place in the classroom and not outside, requiring adventure, or experiential in nature are becoming more prevalent as explorers and expedition based researchers strive to connect educational content to their projects.

Expeditionary education can be:

The origins of expeditionary education could be thought to extend far back into early human history through hunting and gathering expeditions where traditional ecological knowledge was learned. Potentially one of the first formal applications of expeditionary education were the field trips conducted through Henry David Thoreau and his brother John's Concord MA grammar school in 1838. Later in the 19th century a summer camping movement was established in response to anxieties about urban and industrial influences on children. During this time, expeditions into "nature" were combined with informal educational pursuits. Scouting, a movement started in 1907 by Robert Baden-Powell iniatiated widespread development of practical outdoor skills which often incorporated expeditionary components like camping, backpacking, and canoeing and has grown to 38 million members in 216 countries 100 years after its inception. By the late 20th century expeditions were being used as educational vehicles by many private and public sector groups and has grown into large groups such as outward bound, serving over 200,000 students in 2006 and National Outdoor Leadership School who have trained over 120,000 people. Various contemporary groups and programs are discussed in #Programs


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