News
In memoriam Kees Both
This week we received the sad news that former PhD-candidate Kees Both died at the age of 79 on September 8th. Kees had been diagnosed with Alzheimer a few years ago. At the time he and ELS’ Arjen Wals, who was his promotor, decided that it would be wise to abandon the PhD project even though it was near completion. Over the last few months Kees’ health rapidly declined.
Kees had a gentle soul and a passion for nature. He dedicated much of his life to creating educational cultures in primary schools that connect children with nature and the planet as a whole. For years he was a senior advisor at CPS (Christelijk Pedagogisch Studiecentrum) and the editor of Mensen Kinderen, a periodical for Jenaplan onderwijs in the Netherlands.
Kees had a remarkeable pedagogical instinct that informed his ideas about emancipatory environmental education. He was also one of the first people within the Dutch environmental education community to engage with action research as a means for professional development and school improvement. Kees can, without a doubt, be considered the most well-read practitioner in environmental education in The Netherlands. He was a walking library, always referring to key scholars and novel insights from all over the world.
His PhD work focused on the development of an ethic of care in schools using the ideas of Nell Noddings as inspiration. He called working on his journey ‘a quest’, one that he was unable to finish, but his ideas and inspiration will travel further.