Environmental Education: Nurturing of the Humanistic Orientation of a Personality

The way to a high ecological culture of a society lies through effective environmental education. Training of citizens with a high level of environmental knowledge, consciousness, and culture based on new criteria for assessing the relationship between human society and nature (not violence but harmonious coexistence) should become one of the main levers in addressing environmental and socioeconomic problems of modern Russia. The research is aimed at analysis of possibilities of environmental education in the upbringing of a humanistic orientation of the personality. Based on an expert survey, the article defines the principles of environmental education, the observance of which is necessary for the correct organization of environmental education in universities, increasing its efficiency in the formation of a humanistic orientation of the personality, and also highlights the structural components of the humanistically oriented personality of a specialist when implementing environmental education. The conclusions drawn can serve as the basis for the development of guidelines for the upbringing of a humanistic orientation of the personality in the process of environmental education. The materials and conclusions of the research can also be used in the practice of teaching pedagogical disciplines at the university. The scientific novelty of the research lies in the identification of the structural components of a humanistically oriented personality of a specialist and the directions of their formation when implementing the environmental education.