Abstract

Experiential education produces numerous benefits to students in terms of higher order thinking skills such as the ability to evaluate, analyze, and synthesizeinformation, engagement, and work-readiness. Partnering with community organizations provides a means to create experiential education opportunities for students. In this symposium, we discussed three examples of experiential education to promote learning around themes of sustainability, providing a brief outline of the activities, the intended outcomes, and the lessons learned from our experiences. We concluded with a meditation on the importance of working with community partners and managing expectations so that students, the community, and the institutions gain the best possible outcomes when creating town-gown partnerships for sustainability education.