Chris Adam is Executive Director of the Earthvalues Institute in Quebec, Canada.

Chris is a prodigious educator who truly represents EE at the private and non-profit corporate levels, as well as the formal and non-formal educational levels. His dedication to EE has directly touched over 150,000 individuals and hundreds-of-thousands more indirectly for 25 years. Many leaders have been inspired by his teaching and guidance.

Chris’ holistic viewpoint emphasizes the concept that the heart comes first and then action. This is the guiding force throughout his courses and is shown in his lifestyle. Chris uses an interdisciplinary approach bridging the arts and sciences consistently, using Nature as a catalyst to stimulate reading, writing, speaking and listening. His ability to demonstrate the importance of feeling and knowing and its relationship to motivating students into action is much respected.

Through a private company he founded in 1982 (specializing in EE program development) and as acting volunteer president for the last 10 years, Chris has presented over three-hundred professional development workshops including conferences and summits throughout the province for educators at all levels of the educational system (pre-school to university). Topics include value issues, sustainable development, environmental education programs and school as community.

Chris has developed and implemented environmental programs for schools, camps, school boards, government and municipal recreation departments.

He has developed and offered environmental audits, camp and school naturalization projects, and co-operative science fairs and 100’s of field trips.

Chris has worked as an education program consultant and board member of the Jane Goodall Institute of Canada from 1995 – 1998.

Through the Quebec Reading Association, Chris has led workshops weaving reading and writing through EE.

1998 – present: founded and currently the executive director of the Earthvalues Institute, a non profit charity that develops educational programs that lead to sustainable living and leaders for change. Through Earthvalues, Chris’ visionary programming skills have developed the following programs, collectively adopted by school boards, colleges, individual schools, camps, municipalities, and individuals: Nature as Mentor (1998 – present) – how to use examples in Nature to teach subject content; Environmental Leadership Program (1995 – present) – combining experiential EE with group leadership skills and action research; Earthvalues Program (1991 – present) – overnight EE programs that emphasize values clarification and responsible action; Action Conservation (2001 – present) – student-directed and teacher guided energy, waste and water conservation audits for schools with action campaigns and evaluations all linked to education ministry curriculum objectives; Wildlife Gaining Ground (2005 – present) workshops and web site that teach people how to garden to benefit local wildlife. www.earthvalues.org

1993 – present: (full time since 1997) faculty member and environmental education specialist with the Community Recreation & Leadership Training Program at Dawson College in Montreal, Quebec’s largest college. Was voted by students to receive the 2003 teacher excellence award. Developed a 45-hour, 3-credit Environmental Leadership Experience course offered by the college since 2002. Since 1993, helped organize and develop Canada’s largest student-led outdoor education course with 100 participants over five days involving 4 full credit college courses.