Help us get boots on the ground and in the… creek?
Join our education initiative this Giving Tuesday, the international day where we give to the non-profits we love. You can directly support our outdoor education program that gets kids outside learning firsthand about our water systems, conservation, wildlife, land use, and history. Though we live in an outdoor destination, many local students have few opportunities to explore outside or connect with the outdoors in a meaningful way. This year, PPLT created a successful outdoor education and experiential program for local high schoolers and we need your help to expand. Proceeds from this #GivingTuesday’s campaign go to fund equipment, like nets, boots, magnifying glasses and transportation to get more classes out in nature, by a creek, or on a trail.
For decades PPLT has led family hikes, taken school groups to explore Mount Helena, and grown an outstanding corps of trails and education volunteers. But with PPLT’s newest properties close to town, there are incredible opportunities for students to interact with our land and waters in new ways. Tenmile Creek Park, with its easy creek access, is being developed as an outdoor playground for all, and Sevenmile Creek is an outdoor classroom where students can watch a new habitat and floodplain take shape in real time. We are working on opening even more local lands and waters to students with our East Helena Greenway project.
Join the effort. To address the challenges of the 21st century—population growth and pressure, drought, wildfire, habitat destruction, and the loss of agricultural land—we need an entire generation that is comfortable and confident with the outdoors and its natural systems. We need your help to grow our future conservation and outdoor leaders. That starts by getting kids to connect with and understand the environment—and you make this possible through your contributions this #GivingTuesday.
Here’s a snapshot of what PPLT’s education program did in its first year:
- PPLT hired AmeriCorps VISTA member, Callie Schultz, to work with teachers and volunteers in the community.
- Volunteers worked with 6 high school teachers and several classes to get kids learning about conservation on-the-ground, but demand is higher.
- Around 20 volunteers received educational training to lead in-depth and standardized lessons for high schools–and our numbers are growing!
- Volunteers contributed 66 hours to leading our new education programs this year.
PPLT’s new standardized lesson plans:
- Healthy floodplains and macroinvertebrates (AKA: water bugs!)
- Dynamics of stream restoration
- Invasive species, plant identification, and weed pulling
- Humans, habitat, and grizzlies
- Public and private land protection
- Montana and Native history
- Designing an aquaponic system
- Dams, hydropower, and fish passage
More outdoor classes on the way!
You can directly support Prickly Pear Land Trust and the efforts to get more kids learning about conservation in our outdoor classrooms by making an online donation!
Thank you for supporting our efforts to get more kids outside, and for helping us spread the word to your friends, colleagues, and neighbors. The future of conservation depends on the next generation!
