The Wild Wanderers first grade team edited and facilitated three classroom lessons and one field trip to Mt. Pisgah Arboretum. These lessons aimed to teach students about the species of oak savannahs, including how this diverse ecosystem changes throughout the seasons each year. Focal species included the Oregon white oak (Quercus garryana), western gray squirrel (Sciurus griseus), gall wasp (Cynips quercusfolii), black-tailed deer (Odocoileus hemionus), and turkey vulture (Cathartes aura).  By teaching first graders how to use their senses to be more aware in nature, students learned how to make scientific observations about the world around them. They then learned to connect these observations to changing seasons and lifecycles centering focal species, forming a deepened sense of place and prompting further curiosity.

I played an integral role in developing the above curriculum in relation to the Learning In Places frameworks, which combines socioecological systems, culture and community, and place-based learning with scientific observation. This text was central to our teaching methods. It was my role to dive deeply into the "Nature-Culture Relations" framework, as well as "Culture, Learing and Identity" and use their teachings to inform my process as we continued the development of our deliverables.

Additionally I assisted in team communications with community partnersand team managers. Including logistics of field trips/classroom visits, community event information and team needs. The work that I completed with the Environmental Leadership Program was almost entirely collaborative, which required constant teamwork and community building which was extremely rewarding to take part in.