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CGEE was founded as part of Hamline University's Graduate School of Education in 1990 with an inspired, larger-than-life learning adventure. Founding director Jennifer Gasperini started CGEE at Hamline in the aftermath of engaging more than 15 million students worldwide in the heady excitement of following the Will Steger's 1900 Trans-Antarctic Expedition adventure.
For several more years the promise of adventure learning was advanced through the development of educational programs that focused on bicycle expeditions led by Dan Buettner through tropical Africa and Central America, sailing adventures on the open seas, and a climbing expedition on the Antarctic continent. Celebrated week-long summer institutes on related topics drew to Hamline's campus noteworthy experts and teachers from throughout North America.
Gradually, this adventure-learning model has evolved from travels to distant, exotic destinations to adventures closer to home. In CGEE's internationally recognized Thousand Friends of Frogs program, founded in 1996, students study frog populations in their own backyards. Then they share their scientific data with prominent scientists concerned about population decline and increased malformities among Earth's amphibians.
The Self Expressing Earth program, created in 1997 by nationally acclaimed poet John Caddy, also heightens sensitivities to local environments while teaching principles of ecology through the creation of writing, art, dance, and music.
The Rivers of Life program (1997) uses an extensive web site to examine issues facing the Mississippi River while engaging students and teachers worldwide in learning about streams in their own back yards. An annual student expedition aboard a hand-built 50-foot sternwheeler on the Mississippi, which is followed via the Internet by students around the globe, culminates the annual program.
Graduate credit for teachers engaged in these and other CGEE programs is now offered as part of a large selection of classroom courses, intensive summer institutes, graduate certificate programs, and Internet-based classes. CGEE's Masters in Education: Natural Science and Environmental Education degree began accepting students in autumn, 2002.
Near the turn of the millennium, the Center also expanded its citizen education and media production programs. These have included an award-winning traveling exhibit on water quality developed with more than 40 partner organizations and an acclaimed site-specific public dance performances by CGEE Artist-in Residence, choreographer Marylee Hardenbergh. The Center has won widespread recognition and many awards for the in house production of high quality educational media products, including multimedia kiosk programs and websites, CD ROMS, and numerous videos.
