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Schools in Europe and the Amazon learning together

Amazon Guardian Schools Network. Since 2016 we have connected classrooms, teachers and Indigenous communities of the Juruá valley with European schools.

Workshops for your school About the Network

Escola Intercultural Amazònia (Amazonia Intercultural School)

We connect Indigenous schools in the Amazon with European schools: exchanges between classrooms, teacher training, workshops and teaching materials created with the communities themselves.

We do not move a model from one place to another: we make knowledge travel in both directions.

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In addition to promoting exchanges and building connections between students and teachers, we design educational projects, run training programmes and create our own teaching materials in various formats. These resources may be developed by our team, by collaborating professionals, by participating teachers or jointly with Indigenous communities, respecting their decisions, knowledge and forms of representation.

We work to bring interculturality, collective rights, climate justice, languages, memory, territory and the ethical use of technology into educational processes.

Through all of this, we are building an educational network based on mutual learning, cultural respect, horizontal cooperation and care for life.

Global North–South connection

Amazon Guardian Schools Network

Map showing the network’s schools in Spain and the Amazon
Children drawing at an environmental workshop

Educational realities, shared learning

In the Amazon, Indigenous schools combine formal education with the transmission of languages, memory, culture, a relationship with nature and community organisation. Their work responds to the reality and priorities of each community, linking generations, territory and new educational tools.

Many carry out this work in contexts of geographical isolation, difficulties with access and connectivity, a lack of context-specific teaching resources and few opportunities for ongoing teacher training. In some villages there is barely a school, or a single teacher for all ages, and to carry on studying children have to leave the community.

In Catalonia and elsewhere in Europe, schools also face the challenge of educating in an interdependent world. Exchanges allow students and teachers to explore collective rights, interculturality, global justice, biodiversity, prejudice and our relationship with nature, technology and the community.

Meeting with Indigenous representatives at a school

Amazon Guardian Schools Network

The Network builds links between students, teachers, Indigenous schools in the Amazon and schools in Europe. Its work combines teacher training, workshops with students, videoconferences, exchanges and the creation of both its own and shared teaching materials.

Each collaboration is adapted to the priorities and context of the participating schools and communities. It does not seek to transfer an educational model or a single vision from one territory to another, but rather to help knowledge, experiences and questions flow in both directions.

Learn about the network

Catalan Schools

Amazon Schools

A track record built since 2016

The association was founded in 2016 and the educational project began in 2017 with a collaboration between the Escola Ixubãy Rabuī Puyanawa and various schools in Catalonia. Building on this partnership, activities with students and teachers, school exchanges and teaching materials have been developed, followed later by teacher training and the educational use of technology.

The collaboration with the Puyanawa people continues and opens a new phase of expansion towards the Nukini community and the Escola Estadual Rural Indígena Pedro Antônio de Oliveira. This process is unfolding gradually, in line with the community’s own priorities, decisions and educational reality.

Puyanawa

Nukini

For your school

Three ways in for schools: workshops in the classroom, joining the Network and ready-to-use materials.

Beyond the classroom

The «Povo Puyanawa» exhibition, the illustrated story, the Puyanawa people’s album and the documentary under way were all born of the same bond that holds the Network together.

See the projects

“The Amazon is home to more than 400 Indigenous peoples and around 2.2 million Indigenous people, with an extraordinary diversity of languages, knowledge, cultures and ways of relating to the land.”Science Panel for the Amazon · Amazon Assessment Report 2021

In the media

See everything in Press

Be part of EiAmazonia

Supporters, volunteers, schools, Indigenous communities, professionals, institutions and companies can take part in the Network in different ways. Explore the ways to collaborate and find the one that best suits you or your organisation.

Choose how to take part
People from the Puyanawa community dancing in a circle, holding on to one another

“The Network grows with you” campaign

We are looking for 50 regular supporters this school year

A monthly contribution, however small, lets us plan the school year without depending on a grant.

Join in