October 16, 2026 | St. Kitts and Nevis
Fourteen secondary school teachers from St. Kitts and Nevis participated in an immersive learning experience at Liamuiga Natural Farms on Friday, October 16, as part of the EcoYouth Ventures initiative. The visit provided educators with an opportunity to explore sustainable environmental practices firsthand while preparing to bring practical, project-based environmental education into their classrooms.
EcoYouth Ventures is a regional initiative supported by the Pan American Development Foundation (PADF) and the Republic of China (Taiwan). The programme seeks to equip young people with the knowledge, skills, and confidence to address environmental challenges through innovation, collaboration, and practical problem-solving.
Set against the backdrop of the island’s mountainous landscape, Liamuiga Natural Farms provided an ideal setting for connecting classroom learning with real-world environmental solutions. Teachers explored the farm’s off-grid operations, observing sustainable practices such as solar energy generation, rainwater harvesting, and environmentally responsible agriculture.
Beyond the farm tour, the experiential day provided an important opportunity for educators to begin translating the EcoYouth Ventures curriculum into meaningful learning experiences for their students.
Working in school-based teams, teachers engaged in collaborative planning sessions to identify potential student projects, establish implementation timelines, and explore opportunities for field visits and other experiential learning activities. These discussions marked an important step towards introducing the programme to Form 3 and Form 4 students across the Federation.
As part of the experiential day, teachers also received the EcoYouth Ventures curriculum guides, which will support the delivery of the programme in participating schools. These resources, together with the implementation planning activities, are intended to help educators move from training to classroom application.
“What we want is for our students to move beyond simply learning about environmental challenges to actually thinking about what they can do to address them. For that to happen, our teachers need opportunities to experience this kind of learning themselves. The visit was not just about exploring sustainable practices; it was also about helping teachers begin planning how to bring these experiences into their schools.” Golda Palmer, Local Project Coordinator
The visit built on a two-day teacher training workshop held in September, during which 26 educators representing 10 secondary schools were introduced to innovative teaching approaches, digital tools, and strategies for facilitating project-based environmental learning.
The EcoYouth Ventures curriculum focuses on six interconnected themes: Climate and Coasts, Energy, Food Security, Waste, Biodiversity, and Tourism. These themes encourage students to examine environmental issues within their own communities and develop solutions that are relevant to the Caribbean context.
As part of the programme’s upcoming Grand Challenge, students will work collaboratively, with guidance from mentors and teachers, to investigate local environmental challenges, design innovative solutions, and present their projects and prototypes at a national school fair. Outstanding teams will have the opportunity to represent St. Kitts and Nevis at a regional youth summit in Saint Lucia in 2027.
The initiative involves 10 secondary schools across the Federation: Basseterre High School, Washington Archibald High School, Cayon High School, Dr. Denzil L. Douglas Secondary School, Charles E. Mills Secondary School, Verchilds High School, and Immaculate Conception Catholic School on St. Kitts; and Charlestown Secondary School, Gingerland Secondary School, and Nevis International Secondary School on Nevis.
Through experiences such as the visit to Liamuiga Natural Farms, EcoYouth Ventures is helping to bridge the gap between environmental knowledge and practical action, empowering teachers to guide the next generation of environmentally conscious thinkers, innovators, and problem-solvers.
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