For five years, EarthRights International (ERI) partnered with the Ecuadorian organization Centro de Derechos Economicos y Sociales (CDES) in running the EarthRights Amazon School. This school brought together indigenous and community leaders from Bolivia, Colombia, Ecuador, Peru and Venezuela to take an intensive course covering human rights law, environmental monitoring, development politics, fact-finding, documentation, advocacy, and media work. Following their graduations, these leaders returned to their communities with new understandings of the realities of the Amazon region, new skills for advocacy, and a network of colleagues and friends from the region and abroad.