Place-Based Education Immersion Experiences

Belle Isle: An Urban Learning Lab in a Nature Oasis

Location: Detroit, MI
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 9 am–4:30 pm
Limit: 40 participants
Cost: $75 (includes entry fee to the Belle Isle Aquarium)

Spend the day exploring a cherished and historic urban oasis–Belle Isle Park–including activities at the Belle Isle Nature Center, Belle Isle Aquarium, and Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory. Belle Isle Park is a 982-acre island park in the Detroit River, offering a mix of natural beauty, historic landmarks, and recreational attractions, and serves as a hub for both relaxation and community engagement in Detroit. The day will begin with field activities on the shores of Belle Isle where the Detroit Zoological Society’s (DZS) conservation program monitors the mudpuppy, Michigan’s largest amphibian.  Next on the agenda is a visit to the Belle Isle Nature Center to explore strategies for building a sense of belonging in place. Tours of the historic Belle Isle Aquarium and Anna Scripps Whitcomb Conservatory will then explore robust educational partnerships in place throughout the island, including the BIG Belle Isle Lesson (BBIL), through which teachers from Detroit Public Schools Community District bring students to the island for a week-long experience to learn about the island’s resources.

*Lunch will be provided.

Natural Connections Through PBE, Part 1: Matthaei Botanical Gardens & Nichols Arboretum

Location: Ann Arbor, MI
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 9 am–12 pm
Limit: 40 participants
Cost: $40 ($75 if selected as a full day immersion experience with Part 2 at Bruin Lake)

Begin your conference experience immersing yourself along the trails of the University of Michigan’s Matthaei Botanical Gardens and Nichols Arboretum. Learn how the Gardens responded to the return of the American beaver (aka Castor canadensis or amik in the Ojibwe language). The ensuing excitement, public inquiry, and concern provided educational engagement designed to support community-wide relationship building and stewardship. The Gardens’ education team’s approach to biodiversity awareness—centered in place-based learning and experiential engagement with diverse age groups—will provoke curiosity and opportunities to explore how to implement keystone species inquiry practices and stewardship projects  in your own community. Through this experience, you will consider relationship building, systems thinking, biodiversity, and play as dynamic elements of place-based inquiry and action.

* Snacks will be provided. 
**At the conclusion of this experience, participants will have the option to either return to EMU (and possibly join an afternoon immersion experience) or continue on to the Woodlands at Bruin Lake. 

Natural Connections Through PBE, Part 2: The Woodlands at Bruin Lake

Location: Gregory, MI
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 12–4:30 pm (includes travel time)
Limits: 30 participants
Cost: $40 ($75 if selected as a full day immersion experience with Part 2 at Matthaei Botanical Gardens & Nichols Arboretum)

The Woodlands at Bruin Lake features 120 acres of forested wildlands and a teacher/administrator learning retreat center offering highly impacting educator professional development focused on 3P (project/problem/place-based), STEM, eco-justice, literacy, and educator wellness.  Visiting the Woodlands will provide participants the opportunity to see how nature and the outdoor setting can be used as context for experiential, hands-on teaching and learning experiences of meaningful duration—providing connections to the environment, the community, and each other. See how educator experiences at the Woodlands can translate to student stewardship in your own place, leading to more connected, interdisciplinary,and deeper learning outcomes in the classroom. This immersion will provide participants with reflective practices designed to showcase the depth of impact of specific “teacher-moves” on learners. Experience a replenishment of your own energy as you also begin to build and learn to sustain practices that will help to lift and empower student voice, intentionally shifting ownership of the learning to the students.

*Lunch will be provided.

Weaving Place into Your Pedagogy: A Practical Guide to Place-Based Education

Location: Ypsilanti, MI
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 9 am–3:30 pm
Limits: 24 participants
Cost: $60

This immersion experience will develop a foundation for place-based teaching and learning. Heed a ‘Call to Action’ by assuming the role of a student engaged in a place-based teaching unit centered around a local environmental issue, school materials (waste) management. Seek to understand relevant data using two Michigan data portals, Michigan-specific/Great Lakes regional curriculum and partner resources, and a cross-curricular approach aligned to Michigan state standards.  Explore Ypsilanti to witness how local community partners help to foster a relationship between youth and their community. Tour Ypsilanti neighborhood schools to see place-based education in action. Synthesize the day’s learning with time to plan your own place-based education unit with support from workshop hosts, community partners and resources, grant and funding opportunities , and continued professional development.

*Lunch will be provided. 
**There may be an opportunity to join for the field excursion part of this experience only. 

Long-Term, School-Wide PBE: Exploring and Protecting Mill Creek

Location: Dexter, MI
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 9 am–3:30 pm (includes travel time)
Limits: 20 participants
Cost: $75

Discover the wonders of Mill Creek with Wylie Elementary’s 3rd and 4th-grade students and teachers in an inspiring, student-led exploration! Just a short walk from the school, Mill Creek offers a unique connection to the community’s rich history and natural beauty.

Once the site of a dam built by Judge Samuel Dexter in 1824 to power local industry, and later enhanced by Henry Ford, Mill Creek’s history mirrors the growth of the village itself. Today, this transformed area is home to the vibrant Mill Creek Park, featuring scenic trails, wildlife, and even one of the few visible beaver dams in Washtenaw County.

Wylie students have embraced this incredible resource, grounding their place-based education (PBE) projects in the history, ecology, and opportunities of Mill Creek and its surrounding park. Join us for an unforgettable experience as students guide you through engaging activities along the creek corridor and share their discoveries.

Afterward, dive deeper with Wylie teachers as they reveal how PBE is seamlessly integrated into the curriculum, inspiring a deeper connection between students, learning, and the world around them. Don’t miss this chance to see PBE in action!

*Lunch will be provided.

Traveling Dialogue: Community Conversations on Ecojustice and Place-Based Education

Location:Various stops in Detroit, MI
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 9 am–3:30 pm (includes travel time)
Limit: 30 participants
Cost: $75

This immersion experience will give participants a chance to experience how place-based learning centers community issues and priorities across Southeast Michigan including air quality, increasing resilience to the threats of climate change, and maintaining and deepening our sense of belonging and community identity. Designed as a ‘Traveling Dialogue’, this immersion experience will bring participants to the doorsteps and into direct conversation with community educators and leaders employing innovative place-based strategies as a grassroots, community-led approach to addressing issues of ecojustice, while providing critical context and opportunities for reflection, community-building, and dialogue with other participants along the way. Attendees will have an opportunity to listen to the stories of challenges and solutions offered by communities that are contextualized within the larger built structures and natural ecosystems in our region.

Traveling Dialogue stops will include a visit to the Eastside Community Network in Detroit to learn about their Neighborhood’s First Engagement Model and their place-based leadership development programs including the LEAP Sustainability Fellowship, the Detroit River Watershed Management Plan, and the Eastside Youth Fellowship.

Additional stops will be added once confirmed. 

*Lunch will be provided.

Starting in Place: Reading Cultural Landscapes

Location: Ypsilanti, MI, and Eastern Michigan University campus
Wednesday, November 12, 2025, 1–4 pm
Limits: 30 participants
Cost: $30

Historian Matt Siegfried’s work has largely centered on connecting local history to broad historical moments. With a focus on race, class, gender and power in our social landscape, Matt believes that the ground and built environment we walk through every day is alive with worlds of history and can speak to us about why we live the way we live. Join Matt—and other PBE practitioners—on a walking/rolling history tour on and around the Eastern Michigan University campus focusing on how to look at your immediate places in different, new ways that create deep impacts to your place-based education practices. Participants  will practice instructional design for place-based learning using the Southeast Stewardship Coalition’s (SEMIS) Starting With Place protocol,  practice reading cultural-ecological landscapes, and think about the connections between histories of our places and the actions we take collectively to make change.