About the Schuylkill Center

Inspiring connections between people and nature

Clusters of milkweed flowers growing in a wildflower garden.

The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education is a regional and national leader pioneering urban environmental education with innovative programs, the country’s most ambitious environmental art program, Philadelphia’s only wildlife clinic, Pennsylvania’s first Nature Preschool, and a commitment to stewarding our land.

Founded in 1965, the Schuylkill Center is one of the first urban environmental education centers in the country, with 365 acres of fields, forests, ponds, and streams in northwest Philadelphia. 

Mission & Vision

Our Mission:

The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education inspires meaningful connections between people and nature. We engage with our forests and fields to foster appreciation, deepen understanding, and encourage stewardship of the environment.

Our Vision:

As a leader in the next generation of environmental education, the Schuylkill Center creates a world where all people play, learn, and grow with nature as part of their everyday lives.

  • History

    We recognize and acknowledge that the Schuylkill Center stands on the Indigenous territory known as Lenapehoking, the traditional homelands of the Lenape, also called Lenni-Lenape. We honor the Lenape and other Indigenous stewards of this landscape, past, present, and future.

    The Schuylkill Center for Environmental Education opened its doors on July 1, 1965, as the Schuylkill Valley Nature Center. Envisioning an “island of green” where city dwellers could experience and learn about the natural world, sisters Eleanor Houston Smith and Margaret Houston Meigs, along with their families, donated the extensive parcels of farmland and woods that make up the Center’s grounds today. We were one of the first environmental education centers located in a major American city, offering immersion in nature to students, families, and adults all within the city of Philadelphia.

    Since then, we have been a regional and national leader, pioneering urban environmental education with innovative programs, the country’s most ambitious environmental art program, the area’s only wildlife clinic, Pennsylvania’s first Nature Preschool, and a commitment to stewarding our land.

    Today, the Center continues to offer environmental education to our communities through four interrelated core program areas: Education, Land Stewardship, the Wildlife Clinic, and Environmental Art.

  • Financials

    Financials

Contact Us

(215) 482-7300
[email protected]