Environmental Education in Brazilian Federal Institutes: The Challenges of Critical and Participatory Environmental Education in High School and Vocational Education

Abstract

Critical Environmental Education is linked to the understanding that the educational process is also constituted as a political act, forming citizenship through social practice. The objective of this work is to discuss the experiences of Environmental Education of the Brazilian Federal Institutes in high school and professional education in the northern region of Brazil and their advances and challenges in the search for a Critical and Transforming Environmental Education. Three projects already developed with high school students and from different professional training courses and the community were selected. We can affirm that innovative proposals, if on the one hand, face the challenge of their implementation because they run into traditional models of education, on the other hand, they represent the possibility of involving the entire academic community in a transformative education, either in the implementation of specific actions, or in the elaboration of long-term programs such as the IFAP Computer Waste Management Plan. Thus, the incorporation of critical and participatory pedagogical and environmental practices can go beyond the allusion to commemorative dates, enabling the construction of a practical concept of Environmental Education, which can be opposed to the traditional concepts established within the theoretical discussion about Environmental Education.