8 Tl HE A; U.D.0 BONS BiG Lo OiBw iain. 
ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION IN ILLINOIS: 
DEFICIENCIES AND PARTIAL SOLUTIONS 
by MRS. ELIZABETH KELLY 
Editor’s Note: This report by Mrs. Kelly, of 
Carbondale, IIl., was prepared this year for Lt. 
Gov. Paul Simon’s Environmental Task Force. It 
has been edited somewhat for publication here, 
and does not include certain addenda from the 
U.S. Office of Education and other sources. 
Existing Programs and Laws: 
It is law in Illinois that conservation be taught in the schools of Illinois. 
Illinois, in the Department of Public Instruction, has a Supervisor of Con- 
servation Education; in fact, two men are employed in the supervision of 
conservation Education in the state. There is a Conservation Education 
Association or Council which is a group of educators and subject specialists 
who serve with no recompense, not even mileage, and who have no ap- 
parent duties other than individually to assist the Supervisor of Conserva- 
tion Education if he should ask for their assistance. 
The Department of Conservation has a section called the Conservation 
Education Section of the Parks and Memorials Division. There is, I am told, 
a new “guideline” for teacher certification which directs superintendents 
who are hiring teachers to insist on those with college conservation courses. 
This guideline is not yet public, I believe — and I am reporting the sense 
of it as indicated by a Dean at SIU, who has seen the guideline. 
This is the minimal equipage with which the State of Illinois presently 
looks forward to “producing a citizenry that is knowledgeable concerning 
the biophysical environment and its associated problems, aware of how 
to help solve these problems, and motivated to work toward their solution.” 
It should be pointed out that the new law requiring the teaching of 
conservation in Illinois lacks teeth. Nothing happens to schools which do 
a poor job of implementing this law. The first proposal I have is: We need 
a legislative amendment which would put some teeth in the law by re- 
quiring some evidence of compliance to be demonstrated by local school 
systems and by prescribing in the absence of compliance some form of 
delayable penalty, which would not be levied if acceptable efforts were 
begun by the local school district. The phrase “human ecology” or “the 
relation of man to his environment” ought to be amended into the School 
Code, Section 27-13.1. 
Proposals No. 2 and No. 3: 
Secondly, the staff and funds available to the Department of Public 
Instruction and the Department of Conservation for conservation education 
are meager. Apparently, the two professional staff members in the Depart- 
ment of Public Instruction have to spend the great bulk of their time in 
school visitations, appraising programs. The development of curricula and 
