Excerpt
From the time babies are born, communication is an important part of their everyday lives. Basic needs are satisfied through nonverbal communication. Sight, sound, taste, touch, and smell introduce them to the new world.
As children become older, education and information help them learn about their environment. Long before children become young adults, they have fine-tuned their communication skills to get what they want, interact with others and learn.
So then, why is communication—which we have practiced everyday since we were born—so hard to achieve when it is a conservation message we're trying to communicate?
A professor of journalism and wildlife ecology at the University of Wisconsin once said, “Educating the public in matters of resource management is an intimate and essential aspect of conservation. But it is easier said than done. Both in spite of, and because of, various brands of conservation education, the degradation of our surroundings and the resulting need to protect and enhance the quality of our environment is increasingly entering the consciousness of Americans.”
The job of educating the public about natural resources…informing the public of the need for resource management…communicating the conservation message…is a vital part of …
Footnotes
Mary M. Cresset is public affairs officer, NRCS National Wetlands Team. She has worked for NRCS since 1972 in information and public affairs at Washington DC headquarters and the California and Indiana state offices. She earned a B.S. honors degree in journalism from the University of Maryland.
- Copyright 1995 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society