Smriti Safaya

Smriti is a Research Associate on the CHILI project examining air quality in schools and their health effects on students, using the SAMHE citizen science platform. She is a recipient of a Royal Geographical Society Innovative Geography Teaching Grant, working in partnership with a school teacher in Hitchin, to co-create a Geo-environmental Citizen Science Toolkit for educators. She is a member of Inclusive Citizen Science, SEI York’s citizen science research group.

Prior to joining SEI as staff, Smriti was an SEI affiliated researcher and a Croucher Foundation Postdoctoral Fellow focusing on the “Environmental Citizen Science in Schools” project looking at the impact of such environmental education on how U.K. and Hong Kong youth feel, think and act towards the natural environment. This research is an extension of her PhD in Education (University of York) which involved solely Hong Kong schools.

Her interest in experiential education stems from her years teaching in international schools in Hong Kong after her Bachelors of Education (U. of British Columbia), and her fieldwork seasons during her Masters in Earth Science (University of Hong Kong) and her Bachelor of Science in Geology (University of California, Davis). She is keen to support educators with developing more experiential teaching and learning opportunities, be it with students, pre-service and in-service educators in schools and universities. Smriti has run immersive nature-based experiences for university staff and the public, around the beautiful York campus and the city, to highlight the value of multi-sensory experiential education, including co-organizing the York City Nature Challenge.