I attended another meeting today… But this one was quite special as it is near and dear as they say…. It turns out that a community member has a piece of property laid out in a manner quite similar to that which we hope to create in our nature center. It has a spring and a series of ponds (deeper than any that I would want on school property) fed by that spring. The owner of that property is willing to provide access and to share that site with the district until our nature center can be built. Today we took all of our science teachers out there, with TEKS in hand, to devise ways to use such a facility in our outdoor education efforts. The ideas flowed like the spring itself. Within hours at least one teacher had a class outdoors. I anxiously hope that teachers using the facility will blog about the outdoor experiences.

The answer seems to be up.  Believe me, the first reactions to Project Wild Training was not all “Rose Water and Honey.”  But there was more than enough interest to continue.  The next session will be Project Wild Aquatics.  Possibility a bit of anxiety and a desire for clear communications of goals motivated interested parties to come together for a discussion of the implementation of the Texas Parks and Wildlife grant.  The grant includes handling a wave of 1500 students perusing the grounds and studying the waters of the Nature Center located in Tyler, TX.  We are entering new territory here and need to carefully assess the environmental impact of so many little feet in and around the delicate springs and creek bed.  Plans were formulated and volunteers were plentiful. Support from representatives attending the meeting was exceptional in so many ways: and, a “What can we do to help?” altitude prevailed.  We (a small consortium of East Texas Schools) have an incredible amount of expertise now onboard to assist us in our quest for excellence in our outdoor education programs.  The meeting, called by Texas Parks & Wildlife, had representation from the Inland Fisheries Division, the Wildlife Division, the Nature Center, Natural Resources, University of Texas at Tyler, Project Wild, Texas Master Naturalist, East Texas Woods and Water Foundation, White Oak ISD, and others. Wish us luck.