High Quality Outdoor Learning 2025

This first edition is published on #GlobalOutdoorLearningDay to celebrate the powerful impact of the outdoors on education and personal development. Global Outdoor Learning Day is an opportunity to showcase diverse outdoor learning activities, share best practices, and inspire a love for the natural world in learners of all ages.

The field of outdoor learning is broad and incredibly rich. A wide variety of approaches, delivered by volunteers, professional practitioners and providers, engage participants of all ages and backgrounds in experiences that have the power to be life changing. With significant societal challenges including climate change, equality & diversity in the outdoors, mental health and wellbeing, this guide sets out what good practice looks like, supporting practitioners and providers to deliver the best possible outcomes to their participants.

At the heart of the IOL’s core purpose is a commitment to high quality outdoor learning, and High Quality Outdoor Learning 2025 has a strong heritage. The original document, High Quality Outdoor Education, was written by members of the Outdoor Education Adviser’s Panel in 2005 to complement the good practice already identified in Physical Education. A decade later, the changing landscape of the outdoor sector led the English Outdoor Council to update the original, broadening its scope to encompass the wider field of outdoor learning. Both publications had at their heart ten outcomes that were indicators of high quality practice. The ever-expanding body of research into the value of outdoor learning has evolved understanding about what constitutes quality. This alongside increasing opportunities to engage with different sectors to help meet their goals means that a further update is both necessary and timely.

The Institute for Outdoor Learning is the professional body for organisations and individuals who use the outdoors to make a positive difference for others. IOL is driven by a vision of outdoor learning as a highly valued form of development, education and employment in UK society, and our Members have a shared vision of outdoor learning as a highly valued form of development, education and employment in UK society.

IOL helps set standards and collaborates with many organisations to improve the quality of outdoor learning in the UK. This document offers a framework for providers, practitioners, funders, policy makers and clients to understand the factors involved. It explores the elements of practice and the underlying structures that contribute to the achievement of quality outcomes. Drawing on the expertise of numerous organisations, academics and practitioners, it sets a benchmark for quality across the field of outdoor learning.

High Quality Learning 2025 is here to be used and shared with those who make a positive difference to others, society and the environment. We hope the printed copies are soon well thumbed, marked up and shared. Digital versions likewise, see below.

This document marks the Outdoor Learning Sector’s latest desire and intention to collaborate, think anew and create strategies for the future on how Outdoor Learning can make its full contribution to UK society and beyond.