by Anna Balzer | Jan 20, 2026 | Blog
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition Members, I’m a big fan of Octavia Butler. I know that’s a strange way to welcome the new year and to start a blog that doesn’t typically engage in a lot of literary critique, but I promise I’ll...
by Anna Balzer | Dec 18, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition Members, Happy Winter Solstice! As you gear up to enjoy this busy season of celebration, we hope you are also finding some space for slowness, quiet, and renewal. Before our team disperses for our...
by Sarah Halson | Dec 18, 2025 | Blog, Outdoor Learning Initiative, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Sarah! Check out our social media I originally partnered with the SEMIS Coalition many years ago while working with The Greening of Detroit supporting tree plantings and outdoor classrooms in Detroit schools. My love for the outdoors and my hope to...
by Nigora Erkaeva | Dec 18, 2025 | Blog, Indigenous Ways of Knowing, Place-Based Education, SEMIS Staff Spotlight
Learn more about Nigora! Check out our social media “The practice of observing the living world and taking inspirations for human ways of living from its model is an essential element of indigenous science. It embraces the reality that there are intelligences other...
by Lisa Voelker | Dec 16, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education, Water Quality / Studies
Learn more about Lisa! Check out our social media When I joined Eastern Michigan University’s President’s Commission on Sustainability last year, I stepped into a legacy of progress. Established in 2018 by President James Smith, the commission was created to evaluate...
by Laura Florence | Dec 16, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education, Water Quality / Studies
Learn more about Laura! Check out our social media Happy December! As I look out the window at the falling snow, it’s hard to believe that just a few months ago our SEMIS Coalition members were beginning the school year by adventuring outdoors to launch their...
by Paula Sizemore | Dec 12, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education, STEM
Learn more about Paula! Check out our social media Walking the grounds near the Ypsilanti Community District Offices in winter, you’ll encounter a dozen slim trunks of leafless trees encircled by a protective netting. Continuing west, underneath the slope of a snow...
by Sarah Halson | Nov 25, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education, SEMIS Staff Spotlight
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition Members, Earlier this month, the SEMIS Coalition co-hosted the 9th National Place-Based Education Conference with the Great Lakes Stewardship Initiative, bringing over 500 educators from across the...
by Anna Balzer | Oct 16, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education, SEMIS Staff Spotlight
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition Members, This time last year, as I was writing this monthly blog, I found myself thinking about the changing of seasons, how the seasons connect to our collaborative and individual processes of...
by Anna Balzer | Sep 18, 2025 | Blog, Events, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition Members, In the fall of 2015, I traveled with a group of students from Detroit Public Schools Community District to Grand Rapids to my (and their) first National Place-Based Education Conference....
by SEMIS Coalition | Aug 21, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education
Above: Junko Rondo giving a talk at EMI, January, 2020 Dear SEMIS Coalition, Nice to e-meet you!My name is Junko Kondo. I’m a former public middle school social studies teacher andcurrently an assistant professor at Kyoto University of Foreign Studies in Kyoto, Japan....
by Sarah Halson | Aug 21, 2025 | Blog, Summer Institute
Summer Institute 2025 Photo Journal One of our favorite times of the year at the SEMIS Coalition is the Annual Summer Institute where we have the opportunity to spend a dedicated week fully immersed with educators and community partners embedded in place-based...
by Anna Balzer | Aug 19, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition Members, Welcome to the start of another school year! Whether you had the summer off or it is your busiest time of year, we hope you had a chance to enjoy the many gifts of this season. The SEMIS...
by Anna Balzer | Jul 16, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition, This time of year, the SEMIS Coalition planning team gets to do one of our favorite things – read and hear stories from educators about how place-based learning shaped their classrooms and...
by Willie King III | Jul 14, 2025 | Blog, Youth Voice
Sam Boyd-Scardefield Tucked between the historic Detroit neighborhoods of Poletown and Black Bottom, something powerful is growing—both literally and metaphorically. It’s more than urban gardening. More than architecture. It’s a vision: one where land, community,...
by Anna Balzer | Jun 12, 2025 | Blog
2025 Community Forum Recap “Climate Justice and Tree Equity”, “Sustainable World Conflict Resolution”, “A Place in Time – From Glaciers to an Outdoor Kindergarten” – these are just a few of the 50 youth-led presentation titles from this year’s SEMIS...
by Willie King III | May 9, 2025 | Blog, Youth Voice
Marquise McNeil, Adian Little, David Lockhart, Devin Smith, At Frederick Douglass Academy for Young Men (FDA), leadership starts from within—and the Youth Ambassadors program is one of the school’s most powerful incubators of growth, mentorship, and...
by Anna Balzer | May 9, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition, During my first year as Director, I’ve found that I am always uncovering stories about the history of the SEMIS Coalition. Each new narrative I’ve stumbled across has been a thread just begging to...
by Lisa Voelker | Mar 18, 2025 | Blog, Events, Youth Voice
Student Showcase The Student Showcase during STEAM Week was fantastic! It was easy to see the passions shine through students’ understanding of the academics. Topics ranged from architecture to shelter designs for emergencies. One student started a garden club, seeds...
by Anna Balzer | Feb 19, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition, At the close of our Winter Professional Development day in late January, the 50 teachers, principals, community partners, and SEMIS Coalition team members in attendance gathered in a circle to...
by Lisa Voelker | Feb 18, 2025 | Blog, Place-Based Education, Professional Development Materials
Everyone is an educator; everyone is a learner. We respect the dignity, professionalism, and creativity of educators, both formal and informal, and approach interactions with love, grace, flexibility, humor, and fun. (SEMIS Coalition Principle 7) At our Winter...
by Willie King III | Jan 13, 2025 | Blog, Youth Voice
Bri Antwon Wilson (bottom photo), a senior, and Seligmin Foster (top photo), a 2023 graduate who has remained deeply involved as an alumnus. Detroit Community Schools (DCS) is more than an institution to me—it’s a cornerstone of my identity and growth. My enduring...
by Anna Balzer | Jan 13, 2025 | Blog
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition, Though I’m certain I’m not the first, let me be among the many to welcome you into this new year and this new quarter century! If you are like me, you may be taking time to reflect on your...
by Anna Balzer | Dec 16, 2024 | Blog
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition, As we approach the end of another calendar year, I’d like to take a moment to share my gratitude for all this year – and especially this community – have brought to place-based...
by Lisa Voelker | Nov 25, 2024 | Arts in PBE, Blog, Ecosystems / Biodiversity, Guest author: Jenna Sabolboro, Upper Elementary
Above: Students ride the yellow school bus to the trails on Belle Isle! They are heading for an adventure in photography and to document evidence of wildlife habitat in Detroit. Fourth grade students from The James and Grace Lee Boggs School researched adaptations...
by SEMIS Coalition | Nov 15, 2024 | Blog
Help deepen our ecosystem of support! Since 2007, the Southeast Michigan Stewardship Coalition has facilitated school-community partnerships rich with opportunities that develop students and educators as change makers for healthy ecological-social systems. Our...
by Anna Balzer | Nov 11, 2024 | Blog
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition, Many years ago, I attended a training that opened with an invitation onto ‘the balcony’. This balcony wasn’t a physical place, but a metaphorical higher vantage point on which to rest, reflect,...
by Willie King III | Nov 11, 2024 | Blog, Youth Voice
Art with Purpose: Tolu’s Story On Monday, October 14th, I had the privilege of interviewing Toluwaleyi’ Meadows, a 12th grader at Renaissance High School. I first met Tolu last year in Emily Phillips’ IB Biology class, where they were selected to participate in...
by Anna Balzer | Oct 17, 2024 | Blog
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Hello SEMIS Coalition! There are several points every year that bring the word ‘transformation’ to mind for me, but none so readily as fall. Watching the trees transform from bright greens to even brighter shades of...
by Willie King III | Sep 16, 2024 | Blog, Community Partners, Youth Voice
Youth Voice and Power with members of Detroit Area Youth Uniting Michigan (DAYUM) Earlier this month, I had the privilege of interviewing two members of DAYUM (Detroit Area Youth Uniting Michigan), each offering unique insights into the organization’s evolution and...
by Anna Balzer | Sep 16, 2024 | Blog
Learn more about Anna! Check out our social media Dear SEMIS Coalition members, Welcome to the start of another new school year! We’ve been hearing so much from our teachers and community partners over the past few weeks about your plans for the upcoming year and we...
by Anna Balzer | Jul 9, 2024 | Blog, Gratitude, Power of Community, SEMIS Staff Spotlight
Greetings SEMIS Coalition members! I am so honored and excited to be serving as the new Director for the Southeast Michigan Stewardship Coalition and to be working within and across this powerful, and hopeful community. If we haven’t met yet, my name is Anna Balzer...
by SEMIS Coalition | Jun 20, 2024 | Blog, College / University, Community Partners, Environmental Sustainability, Events, Press Release, Transformational Partnership
Grant to expand high-demand, Eco-STEM Place-Based Learning across southeast Michigan. SEMIS Coalition plans to host engaging and educational events with the new funding. (Photo by Leisa Thompson) YPSILANTI — The Southeast Michigan Stewardship (SEMIS) Coalition at...
by SEMIS Coalition | Mar 15, 2024 | Blog, Civic Engagement
Director's Corner: Strengthening Democracy through Place-Based EducationElection season is upon us and it is tempting to focus on voting as the most important action a person can take to protect democracy. And indeed voting is critically important. But democratic...
by SEMIS Coalition | Jan 4, 2024 | Blog, Grants / Funding, Place-Based Education
Community care grows from common ground.Our 20K goal was met thanks to your support! As we start off 2024, the year that I transition out of the directorship—a position I’ve dedicated a good portion of my career to—I’ve been doing a lot of reflecting on my own...
