Palestine Wildlife Society

The Scholastic “ Ornithology Club” Network (SOCN)

Ongoing Activities

Background:

• Clubs are considered to be one of the best ways to create awareness in people so that they protect the wildlife and nature instead of destroying it.

• The environmental & conservation education activities are related to the concepts of a renewable way, which must be practiced with a joyful factor, and the spirit of rebirth that refreshes the memory and the soul from the stress of memorizing countless information with fun activities.

• This is the main slogan to establish theScholastic “Ornithology Club” Network (SOCN) in the schools.

• Members of the club practice new environmental and conservation education concepts during activities that present the importance of protecting the wildlife in creative ways. 

The Aim:

• The (SOCN) aims at encouraging the students to understand the vital relationship between human beings and the environment.  It inspires students to figure out where human beings fit in the environmental framework.  The students have an active and essential role in this topic since they are the heirs to the future.  Teachers are also essential in this club because they are the bridge over which one can reach the students.

Teachers must be well acquainted with the:  environmental & conservation education (wildlife & nature conservation) material so that participating students can receive informal and formal curricula daily.

 The members of the SOCN:

• Every student is usually a member of this club.  Each student works with his colleagues as partners and his teachers as supervisors to their common objective, which is to increase the awareness of the economic, scientific and cultural values for the natural resources.

Why was the SOCN established?

• The SOCN was created to promote their objectives and aims as mentioned above.  So far, these clubs have has great success accomplishing their objectives.  They have made great progress in changing individual behavior regarding the environment.  This growth was achieved by following the learning and teaching process.
• We can never pass the necessary environmental information to the coming generation unless we increase the environmental awareness in the present generation.

Why do we need these clubs?

• We need these clubs in order to reach the students attending the thousands of schools (public, private, and UNRWA) across Palestine. There is a great need to activate the concepts, principles and aims of modern wildlife & nature conservation in our schools.
• The wildlife & nature conservation in Palestine is still in the beginning stages.  Some NGO’s adopted the idea and have been working on it for several years.  Some tangible results of the education can be seen now in the transformed actions of hundreds of our participating students.
• It is has been agreed upon that some of the Environmental Education (E.E) and Nature Conservation curricula and activities are to be added in to the schools curricula in cooperation with Education Ministry, Education Development Center/Ramallah, and other NGO’s in Palestine. 
• All these firms work hard to sustain the Wildlife & Nature Conservation concepts in our schools since the PWLS was established on 1999.