LEEF is taking a temporary hiatus to improve our programming. Interested teachers, please check back in Fall 2023. We are still recruiting graduate student/postdoc volunteers to help plan and run activities for the Beaty Biodiversity Museum’s Nature Club.
Please email LEEF.ubc@gmail.com for more information.

The Lessons in Evolution and Ecology FUNdamentals (LEEF) program is run through Let’s Talk Science UBC and provides hands-on learning in ecology and evolution to local Kindergarten to Grade 12 students through experiential classroom learning activities developed by trained UBC graduate students and postdocs.

Student participants attend workshops on outreach and science communication, meet with their teacher partner, and ultimately deliver a lesson in the classroom or the outdoors. Lesson topics are typically selected by the teacher and student to align with the provincial curriculum and the student’s area of expertise. See examples of past lessons here.

Our program specifically targets ecology and evolution education due to the importance of these disciplines to understanding current problems such as the loss of biodiversity with climate change, the spread of invasive species, and the vulnerability of species at risk. However, other related topics in biology and science (such as molecular and cell biology, earth and ocean sciences, physiology) are welcome!

The program was founded in 2013 and was previously known as MEED (Modules in Ecology and Evolution Development).