Eshadi Mendis

Eshadi Mendis is a Sri Lankan environmental educator, National Geographic Explorer, and former civil engineer who has rewritten her life script to reimagine what education can be in a world that desperately needs empathy and ecological consciousness. Her story is one of transformation, from a top-performing student locked into the rigid demands of Sri Lanka’s exam-driven education system to a global advocate for biodiversity, community resilience, and youth leadership. At the heart of her work is a question that echoes across every project she leads: What if our classrooms were forests?

Born on November 11, 1992, in Colombo, Sri Lanka, Eshadi grew up navigating expectations and a deep inner curiosity. Though she graduated in Civil Engineering and later completed a Master of Business Administration, her turning point came not from a lecture hall, but from a spider web glistening in her grandparents’ backyard. That childhood moment of awe stayed with her, eventually pulling her away from conventional paths and toward the wild world of biodiversity education.

Her early career saw her working in infrastructure with the Department of Buildings in Sri Lanka, and teaching at the Institute of Technology, University of Moratuwa. But it was the Global Youth Biodiversity Network (GYBN) that cracked open her world. Within a few years, she went from running national consultations to representing Asian youth at the COP15 and COP16 biodiversity negotiations, speaking on stages across Japan, Canada, and Colombia and later becoming a National Geographic Explorer.

In 2024, she launched the Schoolyard Scientists program, with the support of the National Geographic Society. What started as a small initiative has now become a national movement. Through weekly biodiversity documentation, immersive field visits, and empathy-based learning modules, she has mobilised children and educators in 7 provinces of Sri Lanka to connect deeply with the natural world and with themselves. Her field sites range from montane cloud forests to Indigenous villages, often blending ecological science with storytelling, sketching, and deep listening.

She has delivered biodiversity education trainings in Cambodia, co-led Indigenous consultations for Sri Lanka’s national biodiversity strategy (NBSAP), and working on creative conservation tools for communities. Whether speaking to world leaders at the GEF Assembly in Vancouver or sitting with schoolchildren in a village near Sinharaja, Eshadi brings the same fierce commitment to justice, curiosity, and joy.

Her philosophy is radical but simple: We should let children grow up curious, kind, and connected to the Earth. Her approach is unapologetically interdisciplinary, weaving together policy, storytelling, ecology, and rebellion.

When she’s not leading conservation workshops or rewriting education models, you’ll find her writing story-driven pieces in cozy coffee shops, spending time with children in nature, or guiding youth teams through Bioblitzes in cloud forests. She describes herself as a rebel with a heart and a firm believer that the future belongs to those who remember how to wonder and feel nature at heart.