ಅಭಿಷೇಕ್ ಎಂ ಪಾಳ್ಯ ಅವರು ಹೊಳೆಮತ್ತಿ ಪ್ರಕೃತಿ ಮಾಹಿತಿ ಕೇಂದ್ರದ ಪ್ರಕೃತಿ ಶಿಕ್ಷಣತಜ್ಞರಾಗಿದ್ದಾರೆ. ಕಾಡಿನಲ್ಲಿ ಪ್ರಾಣಿಗಳನ್ನು ಗುರುತಿಸಲು ಸಾಧ್ಯವಾಗದಿದ್ದಾಗ ಅವರ ಮಾರ್ಗದರ್ಶಕರು ಪಕ್ಷಿಗಳನ್ನು ವೀಕ್ಷಿಸಲು ಪ್ರೋತ್ಸಾಹಿಸಿದರು. ಪಕ್ಷಿಗಳು ಅವನನ್ನು ಆಕರ್ಷಿಸಿದವು ಮತ್ತು ಅವನು ಅವುಗಳನ್ನು ಗಮನಿಸುತ್ತಾ ಸಮಯ ಕಳೆದನು. ಅವರು ಈಗ ಸ್ಥಳೀಯ ಸಮುದಾಯಗಳು, ಶಾಲೆ ಮತ್ತು ಕಾಲೇಜು ವಿದ್ಯಾರ್ಥಿಗಳು ಮತ್ತು ಇತರರಿಗೆ ಪರಿಸರ ಸಂರಕ್ಷಣಾ ಕಾರ್ಯಕ್ರಮಗಳನ್ನು ನಡೆಸುತ್ತಾರೆ.

Abhishek M Palya is a nature educator with the Holématthi Nature Information Center. His mentor encouraged him to watch birds when he couldn’t spot animals in the forest. Birds fascinated him and he spent time observing them. He now conducts environmental conservation programmes for local communities, school and college students, and others.

Sarbani Nag is a nature educator from Kolkata and runs ‘WISH Foundation’, which promotes citizen science. Having found that birds were the most fascinating species to raise awareness about nature and natural processes, she has conducted several bird-watching programs in and around the city for the past seven years.

Ramnarayan K is an independent researcher and climate change educator from Munsiari, Uttarakhand. He trains and mentors lesser privileged and rural communities in natural history-based citizen science as a tool to broaden their understanding of natural history and environmental sciences.

Jyoti Patale is a conservation educator from Solapur, Maharashtra. Jyoti has been closely working with tribal children in Chhattisgarh for the last 7 years. Finding that there were no discussions on nature observations in their classrooms, she started exploring a nature-based curriculum and context-based classrooms for the children.

Deepa Mohan is a wildlife volunteer and bird educator. She organises regular bird walks in and around Bengaluru, and conducts education sessions in other parts of the country whenever she gets the opportunity. She finds children, for the most part, to be alert and curious, so piquing their interest is easy.

Maxim Rodrigues is an Executive-On-Ground Projects at The Habitats Trust. In 2016, he founded a group called the ‘Kasaragod Birders’, a community of bird watchers and nature lovers. They concentrate on bird-related projects related to citizen science, wildlife education, biodiversity monitoring, and working with kids and community.

तौकीर उत्तराखंड की वन गुज्जर नोमैडिक ट्राइब कम्युनिटी से हैं। वहाँ पर वह पिछले 10 सालों से पर्यावरण शिक्षा पर काम कर रहे हैं । उनके ग्रुप का नाम “मई” है। वह एक्टिविटी-बेस्ड लर्निंग के माध्यम से भाषा, गणित, कला और नेचर एजुकेशन सिखाते हैं।

Taukeer Alam Lodha belongs to the Van Gujjar nomadic tribe of Uttarakhand. He has been enthusiastically working towards nature conservation and education over the past 10 years. He has formed a group called ‘MAEE’ that works with children of his tribe. They focus on activity-based learning to teach languages, math, art and nature education.

Adithi Muralidhar works on education research in Mumbai, understanding how children learn and working to contextualise outreach for impactful nature learning. Through her work, she hopes to help build mindful relationships with nature to broaden people’s understanding and its interconnectedness across disciplines.