Community Partner

Portland Urban Forestry Learning Landscapes

First Advisor

Jeff Gerwing

Date of Award

2025

Document Type

Project

Degree Name

Master of Environmental Management (MEM)

Department

Environmental Science and Management

Language

English

Abstract

Portland Urban Forestry Learning Landscapes is a city program offering free tree planting and establishment services to schools, community groups, and multi-residential zones in the city of Portland, Oregon. This project report, completed on behalf of Learning Landscapes, uses qualitative evidence from interviews with school district administrators, teachers, volunteers, grounds staff, city employees, and outreach experts to gain a deeper understanding of the factors leading to successful collaboration between local school districts and their external community partners. These conversations with school and outreach personnel across the city suggest that district staff are interested in collaborative greening organizations like Learning Landscapes becoming more active participants and project partners in Portland's schools. According to interview participants, successful methods for building mutually beneficial partnerships are based on community connections, establishment of trust, and long-term commitment to student wellbeing. Portland's school districts are interested in working with community partners who: 1) Approach outreach from contexts familiar to the district, like community fairs, 2) Work to relieve schools of as much of the financial and time-based burden of their projects as possible, and 3) Are interested in establishing equitable, long-term, district-wide partnerships rather than one-off single-school events. These preferences align well with Learning Landscapes' goals and operations as a program.

Rights

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Comments

A project report submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Environmental Management.

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