The EarthRights Schools work to enhance the capacity of human rights and environmental leaders to defend their rights and homelands from abuses associated with unsustainable development projects. ERI first opened the EarthRights School Burma (ERSB) in Thailand in 1998, and in 2006 opened the EarthRights School Mekong (ERSM), followed in 2010 by the Health & Earth Rights Training Program (HEART). ERI also helped run the Amazon School for Human Rights and the Environment from 2001-2005, and works with several partner schools in South East Asia. These innovative programs provide rigorous training in human rights, environmental monitoring and advocacy techniques.
The EarthRights Schools teach that earth rights promotion and protection are the cornerstones of democracy, which requires an engaged civil society to secure and defend these rights. Through the EarthRights Schools students gain specific knowledge and skills essential to the creation of a civil society, and take this knowledge out into their own communities.
By investing in students for the long-term, the EarthRights Schools help to create a corps of committed defenders of human rights and the natural world.
In addition to the EarthRights Schools, ERI's training activities include training sessions and workshops covering specific topics with various regional partners.