Teachers learn about California natural resources at the Forestry Institute for Teachers.

UC offers free forestry institute to California teachers

California kindergarten through 12th-grade teachers are invited to apply for a free week-long summer institute co-sponsored by the University of California to boost their interest and teaching skills in forest ecology and forest resource management practices.

Now in its 16th year, the Forestry Institute for Teachers (FIT) has already trained some 1,650 teachers about ways to incorporate real-life natural resources issues into their California standards-based curriculum.

Teachers attend the summer session, but school children ultimately benefit from the educational experience, according to Michael De Lasaux, the UC Cooperative Extension natural resources advisor in Plumas and Sierra counties and a FIT co-director.  Through their teachers, students gain a deeper understanding of forest ecosystems’ relationship with natural resources that humans use for water, timber and recreational activities. The environment becomes the basis for learning in many subject areas, including environmental science, physical science, social science, biology, forestry, history and language arts.

A 2007 FIT participant, MaryAnn Garamendi teaches at a Calaveras County charter school that mentors families who are home schooling their children. Because of the institute, she started a project this year in which families learn together about natural resources by camping out in various natural areas and participating in activities like trail walks with a ranger guide and orienteering.

“Every time we get the kids out, we’re seeing the inquisitiveness and exploration that is so vital to education,” Garamendi said. “The kids are developing a relationship with the environment.”

The Forestry Institute for Teachers will be held at four Northern California locations in June and July. Teachers’ only expenses are a $20 application fee and transportation to and from the camp where training takes place. The program, all meals and lodging are free. Teachers receive extensive classroom and curriculum materials, including the award-winning Project Learning Tree and Project Wild, and a $200 stipend for completing a forest-related curriculum unit or project with their students.

Training offered at four forested locations

The 2008 sessions will be June 15 to 21 at the University of California Forestry Camp, close to Quincy in Plumas County; June 22 to 28 at Camp Chinquapin near Pinecrest in Tuolumne County; July 6 to 12 at Camp McCumber, just east of Shingletown in Shasta County; and July 13 to 19 at Humboldt State University in Arcata, Humboldt County. The presenters and staff include public and private forest resource specialists and other natural resource managers, environmentalists, and science and environmental education curriculum specialists.

Dennis Mitchell, a teacher at Evergreen Middle School in Cottonwood in Shasta County, participated in the second Forestry Institute, held in the summer of 1993.

“The Forestry Institute for Teachers has been the most influential component of my teaching career,” he said. “It has made a tremendous and positive difference in how I teach and how my students learn in my classroom.”

Mitchell was so inspired by the institute, he has come back to lead the program for the past 14 years.

“The Forestry Institute opened my eyes to looking at education from the standpoint of offering my students opportunities to learn using the real resources that surround the students,” Mitchell said.

Last year, Mitchell said, his seventh-grade students learned about the role of fire in nature. The students researched fire ecology, and worked with a local landowner to reintroduce a native species of pine into an area that had burned. The children watched a timber harvest and followed some of the material to a cogeneration plant where the material was processed into energy for the community.

FIT is a partnership that includes the University of California Cooperative Extension, the Northern California Society of American Foresters, the USDA Forest Service, the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection, the California Department of Fish and Game, Project Learning Tree, Project Wild and others.

To apply for a 2008 Forestry Institute session, teachers must complete and return an application form found on the Web at http://www.forestryinstitute.org. For more information, contact Heather Morrison of the Northern California Society of American Foresters at 1-800-738-TREE or ncsaf@mcn.org.

(April 2008)

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