S.E.A.L.S.

Student Environmental Action and Learning Squad

Summer 2009

<<Click Here for Registration Form>>   

If you are a student age 13 to 16, you  can volunteer for a week (or more) at Rye Nature Center this summer.  You and your team will learn a wide variety of hands-on skills and apply them to help maintain our natural habitat and improve the Nature Center.

SEALS is a “service learning” program eligible for school community service credits.  SEALS will be supervised by longtime Rye Nature Center Summer Camp counselor Jeff Toplyn and by Kate Murphy, a college student and RNC volunteer educator with experience in horticulture and construction.

A typical week will include:

Monday:  Morning start with team building activities.  Afternoons will focus on horticulture including designing & planting native wildflower beds.

Tuesday:  Practice carpentry and landscaping skills; then construct stairs on trails, build Orchard Bee houses, or construct a bridge.

Wednesday:  Learn to identify a group of animals or plants and assist in our scientific biodiversity study.

Thursdays:  Attack our invasive plants, save the forest and reclaim a meadow.

Friday:  End the week with something fun and different.  Learn about beekeeping.  Assemble a geodesic dome.  Create an challenge course equipment. Test for pollutants in our stream.

• SEALS sign up for one or more week-long sessions beginning Monday, June 29 and ending August 21, 2009.

• There is no charge for this program.

• Hours:  Drop off at 9:00 AM.  Pick up at 2:00 PM.

• Bring:  A hearty, healthy lunch with plenty of fluids.  Bring a refillable water bottle!

• Wear:  Sturdy footwear such as hiking boots or high top sneakers. No open toes or heels allowed!!!.  Wear clothes that can get muddy and paint spattered.

• SEALS will receive a safety briefing before each activity. 

• Students will not use power tools, ladders or chemical pesticides/herbicides. 

• Safety glasses and work gloves will be provided.

• SEALS will be canceled if heavy rain or wind is predicted.

<<Click Here for Registration Form>>     

Parent/guardian signature required.