Dr. Gerald A. Lieberman
Dr. Gerald A. Lieberman is an internationally recognized authority on school improvement using natural and community surroundings as interdisciplinary contexts for education. He led the development of the innovative educational strategy called EIC Model™, using a school's local Environment as the Integrating Context for learning and, more recently, the development of the curriculum for the State of California's Education and the Environment Initiative. During the past seven years, Dr. Lieberman served as the principal consultant for the State of California’s Education and the Environment Initiative (EEI). The EEI is a cooperative endeavor of the California Environmental Protection Agency, the California Department of Education, the State Board of Education, the Governor’s Secretary of Education, the Integrated Waste Management Board and the Resources Agency. Dr. Lieberman led the development of the State’s approved “Environmental Principles and Concepts” the plan for the “EEI Curriculum.” In 2010, this standards-based curriculum was completed and approved by California's State Board of Education. The EEI Curriculum is now being disseminated to K-12 classrooms throughout California. The EEI Curriculum is available for downloading at: www.californiaeei.org In 1995, Dr. Lieberman founded and has since directed the State Education and Environment Roundtable (SEER), originally a cooperative endeavor of departments of education in 16 states. SEER now works directly with schools to help them meet their academic goals through a process of continuous improvement based on the EIC Model™. SEER's work was sponsored by The Pew Charitable Trusts. The Education Commission of the States recognized SEER's EIC Model™ as a "promising practice… that shows evidence of success in improving student achievement." Over the past 30 years, Dr. Lieberman has created and conducted professional development programs for more than 9,000 educators and other professionals, working with formal education systems at local, state, national and international levels. He has designed and coordinated curriculum development programs in the United States, Costa Rica, Honduras, Colombia and Argentina. During the past five years, Dr. Lieberman has focused his work on professional development programs that help schools achieve school improvement goals through implementation of the EIC approach. Dr. Lieberman is the principal author of Closing the Achievement Gap: Using the Environment as an Integrating Context for Learning, a ground-breaking, national study that received an award from the National Environmental Education Foundation for "bringing environmental learning into the mainstream of American K-12 education." He has authored 40 other major reports, books and articles on subjects related to environment-based teaching strategies and environmental science. Dr. Lieberman received his Ph.D. and M.A. from Princeton University and his B.A. from U.C.L.A. He currently serves on the Board of the Captain Planet Foundation where he chairs the Strategic Planning Committee, and is a past Chair of the Commission on Education of IUCN, the World Conservation Union.
