Three of our Students Earn 100% on Tracker Evaluations!

Huge congratulations go out to Wilderness Awareness Residential Program graduate and former instructor, Casey McFarland; Residential Program graduate, Neal Wight; and Kamana Naturalist Training Program graduate and tracking expeditions participant, George Leoniak!

They are the first 3 people to obtain 100% on their North American Track and Sign Evaluations through CyberTracker Conservation out of the roughly 90 folks formally evaluated thus far! As a result of their performance on these rigorous multi-day field evaluations, they also have the honor of being the first people to be awarded North American Track and Sign Specialist Certificates.

This is an extremely high standard of achievement, and difficult to convey to those unfamiliar with the process. In renowned tracker and author Mark Elbroch's own words (he is the evaluator currently for North America), when speaking of Casey's evaluation as an example, his was a "really incredible performance, he was thrilled, I was thrilled, it's really just stunning... This is really something worth celebrating!"

Our Tracking Intensive students and instructors will be participating in these field evaluations in our area in early May.

For more information on Tracker Evaluations, visit Mark Elbroch's Wildlife Tracking website, or the CyberTracker Conservation site.

Adult Programs Update

1. Adult Intensive Programs: (The Residential Program, Earth Mentor Program, and Tracking Intensive). A reminder that the Regular Decision Application Deadline is Thursday, March 15, 2007!

There are still a few spaces left for Fall 2007, and those who apply by this Thursday (submitted on-line, or post-marked in time) who are accepted for admission will receive priority for the limited scholarship awards and spaces left for enrollment.

Earth Mentor Program News: We are now offering College Credit (6 credits through Western State College) as an option to students in the Program! Don't miss this 6-week summer semester for teachers and other adults...

Tracking Intensive News: We are excited to have Jenn Wolfe joining the program as a third core instructor next year, are planning several new tracking locations, and are currently finalizing new guest instructors too. For adults of all experience levels who want to become skilled wildlife trackers; meets during 10 weekends from Sept-June...

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2. Adult Workshops & Expeditions:
(see our adult programs calendar for more info.)

Featured Program

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The New Outdoor Education -
ENN feature with one of our staff and students

March 13, 2007 — By Michelle Xiarhos Curran, ENN

(excerpt from second half of article) "...That sense of excitement is exactly what John Chilkotowsky, program director at Wilderness Awareness School, a not-for-profit environmental education organization based in Duvall, WA, that offers nature awareness programs for kids as well as adults, said he hopes students take with them when they leave the 20-acre campus adjacent to the Cascade foothills.

"We're really trying to instill that sense of wonder," he said. "We want them to go home feeling like, wow, that was amazing.'"

Students of Wilderness Awareness School programs learn things such as wildlife tracking techniques, medicinal plant preparations and wilderness survival crafts.

In a classroom, Chikotowsky, who was once a teacher, said that students get the sense that nature is something very distant from them -- they are in one place and nature is in another. But being outdoors, and working with small groups in a changing environment, Chilkotowsky said, restores kids hope. It gives them a sense of community and service. They develop a sense of kinship in the wild. "I think that nature is very healing," he said.

And, students often leave Wilderness Awareness School saying, "I feel so alive. I feel like I belong here now on this earth," he added.

Not only are Wilderness Awareness School students developing skills they can use in both their professional and personal lives, but Chilkotowsky said they are also viewing what they learn as a sort of catalyst for their futures -- good news for environmentalists who fear that nature-based occupations are going out of style.

"These kids are coming back saying, "I want to be a wildlife biologist,'" he said.

Not something likely to be said by a student simply reading about nature in a book.

"The natural world is constantly offering new opportunities for teachable moments," said Chilkotowsky, who remembers playing in swamps and building tree forts as a kid. "Simply being outdoors is bringing sensory awareness that's just not happening in the classroom."

Chilkotowsky remembers one particular group of children, who had been following bear tracks for about 20 minutes during one hike. When they stopped to examine the tracks, the instructor asked the group what they thought the bear might have been doing at a in that specific moment. One of the girls, Chilkotowsky said, had an amazed look on her face.

"Do you mean to say there was really a bear right there?" she asked.

Chilkotowsky said that is proof-positive of "the possibility that when you're outside something amazing is going to happen."

Emily Brodie, 16, who attends the Wilderness Awareness Community School, a two-day per week program designed for home-schooled students, stressed that her experience is about so much more than being in the wild and learning outdoor skills.

"The program can be whatever you want, and whatever you make it," she said.

Brodie said because of her involvement with the Community School, she now feels comfortable in different situations. She has more confidence in her dealings with people. She feels fulfilled and happy and has a better understanding of herself.

And though she has always loved the outdoors -- "All of the values that are there, [at the Community School] have always been around me," she said -- she doesn't forget to mention her deeper appreciation of, and curiosity for, nature because of her experience.

"It's really incredible how many mysteries you'll find just walking down the trail," said Brodie, who is no longer afraid to explore the outdoors alone.

So, will this experience influence her life in the long term? Absolutely, said Brodie.

"I could never be happy at a desk job," she said. "I am going to reach for something more."

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