Diferentes concepções de escolas sustentáveis: reflexões de uma experiência interventiva no recôncavo baiano

Abstract

The Environmental Education is one of the most important and effective strategies to the citizenship approach to education and training of students willing to intervene in a socio-environmental reality. With this purpose, the initiative of Eco-schools came up in Europe in the 1990’s, which made the relationship between economic development and ecological appreciation more recurrent in the student’s everyday life. In Brazil, after a decade, the School Conferences discussed such questions to build a school environment able to meet these demands. Therefore, similar programs have been launched, like “Susteinable Schools”, in order to make school a place for activities development aimed to the formation of an environmentally fair society. Considering the experience of a pilot project in Environmental Education which covered the guidelines of these two programs in the Municipal School Jovino Lima, located in Sapeaçu, Bahia, the current research aimed the reflexion about the applicability of both programs in the reality of the Recôncavo of Bahia. The research of a qualitative approach and exploratory nature outlined the study, approaching the executed actions and the causes for the pilot project’s failure besides systematizing features from different conceptions of inspiring programs and highlighting elements for the organization of an applicable proposal for the Recôncavo. It was found that the articulation between the different components of the school community favors the activity development, when there is a representative board, responsible for helping in the program’svdevelopment. However, political, economic and bureaucratic problems deeply influenced the actions’ failure. The analyzed programs have distinct characteristics regarding origin, evolution and theoretical-methodological foundation. The international program highlights the conception of Education for the Sustainable Development, implanted by UNESCO, while the national program suggests a popular and critical perspective. The national programs also indicates fundamental elements to the Formal Environmental Education programs as the school community awareness to social and environmental causes; political and financial support, in actions that include management, curriculum, physical space and school-community relation; besides the adoption of project pedagogy. Therefore, it is deduced that the integralization between the programs can represent an applicable proposal to the Recôncavo’s reality, under the condition of complementing other aspects that favors the school agent’s support in the participation and continuity of strategies, establishing an ongoing and permanent process of transformation through the Environmental Education.