Create a legacy and have a lasting impact!
A Forest & Wildlife Education Project is a powerful way to bring your team’s knowledge, experience, and inspiration from Regenerate back to your school and community.
Throughout the Summit, we’ll provide opportunities for your team to consider your own local connections to our program topics and create an education and action plan to synthesize and share what you learned and experienced in Canmore. This could grow into a bigger Forest & Wildlife Education Project, or could simply be a way for your team to bring their knowledge back to your class. Your team may have project ideas in mind (if so, please include the details in the application form!) or you may use the Summit to start growing ideas.
Upon completion of the summit, each team will have created an education and action plan to synthesize and share what they learned and experienced in Canmore. This could grow into a Forest & Wildlife Education project!
We know that an education project can be a little daunting, so we’ve created outlines for some of our favourite project ideas below. If your team has an idea that does not fit into the categories below, we’d love to hear about it and work with your team to make it happen. You can also check out past projects that have been done here and consider if you could apply them to your school!
Project possibilities are limitless! Here are some ideas:
- Get your boots on the ground and organize a field trip for your class (or grade) to visit a local forest and learn first hand about local forestry practices.
- Plan in a schoolyard or community naturalization project
- Work with your favorite Regenerate experts and host an forest education day for your school
- Implement a “green design” competition to see what your school can create using wood and wood products
- Create your own forest presentation and visit a nearby junior high or elementary school to share all about Alberta’s forests
- Create an awareness campaign to boost environmental literacy and stewardship in your school
- Any other creative ideas you may have!
Education Event
Find a creative way to share the information you gain through your summit experience with your school or community.
Examples:
- Work with your favorite Regenerate experts and host a forest and wildlife education day at your school
- Organize a tour of a local forest operations with your class
- Organize a field trip for your class (or grade) to visit a local forest and learn first hand about local forest and wildlife health
- Get creative and spread the word with a video, art display etc.
- Create your own forest presentation and visit a nearby junior high or elementary school to share all about Alberta’s forests and wildlife
Grow & Build
Showcase creative ways to demonstrate energy/water conservation and efficiency at your school!
Examples:
- Host a “green design” competition to see what your school can create using wood and wood products
- Schoolyard Tree Planting or dedication
- Collaborate with an elementary school for Arbour Day celebrations (check out your community events; in Calgary every Grade 1 student is gifted a tree!)
- Connect with your school’s shop/CTS class to create a wooden structure that’s artistic, practical, or symbolic!
- Build a bat box, nesting platform, or birdhouses tailored for local species
- Set up trail cameras to assess the wildlife using your school yard or local park
Changing Behaviours - change the culture
Improve your school and community environmental stewardship by working on a behaviour changing campaign!
Examples:
- Create an awareness campaign on local or provincial forest and wildlife issues to boost environmental literacy and stewardship in your school
- Reduce, reuse, recycle, repair, rethink of ways to change some common practices in your school to benefit the forest environment
- Establish a new club/team focused on environmental initiatives
Environmental Conservation Project - improve our landscapes
Work on restoring and conserving the natural areas in your community as a means to educate your school and community about the environment.
Example:
- Restore a riparian area near your school
- Help a local organization by volunteering to remove invasive species, plant trees, or participate in a wildlife biodiversity monitoring count
- Organize a litter pick up
- Connect with a local forestry company to learn more about reforestation and forest management in your area
- Organize a BioBlitz - take a biological inventory of your schoolyard, nearby forest or park to assess ecosystem health
- Participate in local, provincial, or national citizen science projects (see here for some ideas)
Interested in doing something else?
None of these ideas fit? That’s okay - bring whatever environmental project idea your team has and we will work with you to make it happen! Contact Natalie Graveline or Jayme Nelson to discuss your ideas.
Get more inspiration from past projects that have been implemented by student leadership teams that have attended past summits.
(Navigate 2018)
M.E. Lazerte, Edmonton
The team designed The Mobile Environment Laboratory or MEL as a tool that has encouraged students to promote discussions about water, climate and the environment. MEL includes various terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, as well as a microgarden to promote conversations and discussions about different environmental impacts that can and have occurred. MEL has promoted conversation about environmental issues within the student body and has provided a focal point to teach students about these issues.
(Navigate 2018)
West Central High School, Rocky Mountain Hous
The student leadership team from West Central High School spread their water and environmental knowledge beyond their own school to a local elementary school. The WCS team is building community environmental stewardship by engaging with younger students through fun, engaging activities.
(Generate 2019)
Matthew Halton High School, Pincher Creek
The Generate leadership team from Matthew Halton High School installed a wind turbine and solar panels on their school greenhouse to power sensors. This installation not only provided renewable energy to their school, but also served as the base for an experiential renewable energy course at their school, enhancing energy literacy in their community.
