Ben Snyder, Former Cape Eleuthera Foundation Board Member states:
“CEF is an organization that supports such important needs for our future – education, research, and sustainability. Few foundations are able to have such a broad and meaningful impact on our world. Those who are involved in CEF programs positively impact the world they inhabit in a multitude of ways – as leaders, as visionaries, of people committed to making the world a better place no matter what path they choose in life.”
The Cape Eleuthera Foundation supports programs in place-based education, scientific research, community leadership, and scientific technologies. The three primary grantees of our programs are The Island School, Deep Creek Middle School, and Cape Eleuthera Institute.
The Island School offers a transformative educational semester and summer journey that takes students away from traditional high school curriculum and invites them to confront authentic challenges. Classes are designed to allow first-hand engagement with the people and environment of The Bahamas. English, math, environmental art, history, and marine ecology are offered, and each course focuses on the application of knowledge to real-world problems. SCUBA diving, island exploration, and two short kayaking expeditions complement daily morning exercise, science research projects, and campus work that encourages each student to develop leadership and teamwork skills.
The Deep Creek Middle School (DCMS) is an independent school for Bahamian students in grades seven through nine located on the southern end of the island of Eleuthera. DCMS offers an experiential approach to the Bahamian curriculum. It is fully endorsed and recognized by the Bahamian Ministry of Education. In 2008, DCMS enrolled 35 students from six settlements in South Eleuthera.
DCMS was founded in September 2001 with the goal of increasing access to educational resources for people of South Eleuthera. DCMS receives funding from Cape Eleuthera Foundation, a non-profit organization, whose mission is to provide place-based education, scientific research, and community leadership in order to create a more livable future on Eleuthera and throughout the world. DCMS works closely with The Island School and the Cape Eleuthera Institute to offer students and staff a unique experience that connects them more intimately with their environment and on-going efforts for sustainable development and environmental stewardship in South Eleuthera.
The Cape Eleuthera Institute is a facility that promotes a connection between people and the environment. The holistic approach to island ecosystems, philosophy of collaboration and relationship building, and intrinsic bond between primary research and education helps to create models of effective resource management and sustainable development. In turn, these model systems help to enhance conservation initiatives and economic prosperity at local, regional, and global scales. CEI’s scope of work includes delivering The Island School semester’s research program, hosting visiting educational programs/field courses for students in primary through graduate school, modeling green technologies that promote self-sufficiency, performing research and collaborating with outside scientists/organizations in areas related to tropical ecology and sustainability, building local capacity through education, training programs, and hosting conferences. CEI facilities were built using sustainable design concepts; the built space is an educational tool in itself and fosters innovation. As one of the most eco-friendly campuses in the world, CEI is contributing to the national dialogue and policy-making efforts to encourage more sustainable development in The Bahamas and similar coastal communities around the world.
The Center for Sustainable Development (CSD) was created in the belief that we have the opportunity to present all of our visitors, students and collaborators with an incredibly unique environment. Situated in southern Eleuthera, The Bahamas, our remote location has always necessitated a high level of self-sustainability, our community size is ideal for the creation and testing viability of working models, and our vision demands that we live well in this place. Many of our successes have been centered around environmental management: our water supply is harvested via rainwater, we boast one of the largest renewable energy systems in the country, we strive to be a zero waste campus, we manufacture our own biodiesel. We’re building upon those successes, looking to new challenges, and continuing to educate in one of the world’s most sustainable classrooms, our campus.
