Tag: news-import
Dear Mayor: Schuylkill Center Members Write to Jim Kenney
January 19, 2016By Mike Weilbacher, Executive Director
Dear Mayor Kenney,
Congratulations on being sworn in as the 99th mayor of Philadelphia. While you’ve got your hands full with a number of things—schools, public safety, jobs—your environmental agenda is crucial. Your predecessor, Michael Nutter, smartly advanced a strong environmental agenda, famously declaring that Philadelphia would emerge as the greenest city in the country—and took us a long way there. Last year, City Council happily decided to permanently retain the Office of Sustainability, and your choice of Christine Knapp to run the office signals that this momentum will continue.
And your promotion of Michael…
Naturalist’s Notebook: The meadow of 2040
January 14, 2016By Anna Lehr Mueser, Public Relations Manager
Imagine your favorite meadow. I imagine mine in September: grasses stand waist high though the underbrush is falling back, seed pods hang in dark silhouettes, forests at the edges of the field mostly green, the promise of red and orange in their leaves.
This is our gift to the future: a meadow in seeds. In our time capsule buried in Jubilee Grove, are seven clear plastic envelopes of seeds. Inside are dogbane, bluestem, grasses, senna, and white snakeroot. These seeds, collected this past fall from the meadows around the Schuylkill Center, offer a…
14,000 hours & counting
January 11, 2016By Claire Morgan, Volunteer Coordinator, and Mike Weilbacher, Executive Director
Throughout our now 50-plus years of educating thousands of people, volunteers have been central to our mission. In fact, we could have accomplished surprisingly little without volunteers. Claire Morgan, our volunteer coordinator, calculates that in the 12-month period ending July 1, volunteers poured 14,000 hours of service into the Center, planting trees, feeding baby birds, measuring water temperatures in streams, hanging gallery exhibitions, even tallying supermarket receipts for dividends.
In this season of giving, we’d like to thank our volunteers for giving us so much.
Like at the wildlife clinic.…
Field Guide: Winter Understory Trees
January 6, 2016By Melissa Nase, Manager of Land Stewardship
With so many efforts dedicated to tracking the biggest or tallest members of our forest, I thought it was a worthy endeavor to dedicate some time to these smaller, perhaps lesser known, understory trees in our woods. While they will never be the biggest or tallest or most majestic, they deserve accolades of their own. Many produce fruit that are prized by birds and mammals, especially during these winter months. Others provide habitat and cover. And others are just simply beautiful trees, small in stature, but with intricate details that are much easier…
Dear 2040: Riverbend Environmental Education Center Imagines the future
December 10, 2015By the staff of the Riverbend Environmental Education Center
Dear Friends of 2040,
We at Riverbend Environmental Education Center in Gladwyne, PA, hope the future finds you well. Living in 2015, we hear reports of melting polar ice caps and experience an increasing number of violent storms. Perspiration trickles down our necks as we work through higher summer temperatures. Climate scientists tells us that global climate change will have accelerated over 25 years. While the Western United States and many parts of the world are projected to be drier and hotter, we imagine our already very-green corner of Southeastern Pennsylvania will…
Hackensack Dreaming: Big & Small
December 8, 2015By Christina Catanese, Director of Environmental Art
Nancy Cohen’s Hackensack Dreaming has transformed our gallery space into an immersive experience evoking the complex wetlands of the Hackensack River. One of my favorite parts of this installation is how it is big and small at the same time. I feel enveloped in the space, and at the same time there are seemingly infinite details to discover the longer I look – in a similar way to being in nature itself.
There are upwards of 120 individual pieces in Cohen’s installation, all handmade glass and paper. I asked a few staff and…
Dear 2040: Damien Ruffner wonders about the future
December 2, 2015By Damien Ruffner, Program Coordinator: Camps & Afterschool
October 2, 2015
Dear Future Program Coordinator: Camps & Afterschool,
I hope this letter finds you well. As I sit here wondering what 2040 will look like at the Schuylkill Center, I can’t help but wonder if even the position will exist in that year. I have been here exactly three years as I write this and my title has changed three times in as many years. So I imagine it will continue to grow and evolve as the programing we offer moves forward.
I’m not sure if compensation time will still…
Children Need Nature
December 1, 2015By Gail Farmer, Director of Education
I was born in 1975, part of Generation X, probably the last generation whose parents felt comfortable sending their kids out into the neighborhood after school. “Go outside and be back by dinner,” was a common directive from my mother. Behind my house was an undeveloped hill, and “The Hill” was where my sisters and I went when my mom sent us outdoors. My childhood was also filled with Girl Scouts, dance classes, and community soccer, but my best memories and my most formative experiences come from the times my mother wanted nothing more than…
Dear 2040: From Judy Wicks
November 25, 2015By Judy Wicks, founder of the White Dog Cafe
Dear citizens of the world in 2040,
If you are able to read this letter, I am relieved. I have been worrying about you - you the children of our children’s children – because today’s humans, your ancestors, are endangering your future by destroying the natural systems your lives will depend upon. When I watch how other species care for their young – from gorillas to penguins to whales – I see how willing they are to give their very lives to secure a safe future for the next generation. Yet…
Environmental Art at Nature Preschool
November 20, 2015By Rebecca Dhondt, Sassafras Lead Teacher
When people think of a preschool experience, art almost always comes to mind. Children need art, not only for the development of their creativity, but as a support for growing cognitive, social, and motor abilities.
All high quality preschool programs incorporate art daily. Walking into a typical classroom, parents will see evidence of painting, gluing and sculpture. Hopefully there will be a well-developed art center with various supplies that are easily accessible to the children. Also, completed works of art will be clearly labeled and prominently displayed around the room and in the halls.…
