Connecting Boys to Nature: How a Camping Trip Engages Students in Environmental Stewardship

It is often said that reconnecting with nature nurtures the mind, body and soul. Beyond that, however, enhancing our connections to nature also serves a larger community purpose: it helps us understand the impact we are having on our environment and how our local ecosystems connect not only to climate resilience, but also social resilience. LISC’s Creative Placemaking efforts center around that core understanding. 

“Coming out of the pandemic, we recognized that one of the things that’s impacting urban core neighborhoods is a lack of access to green space and nature,” said Kristopher Smith, community development program officer for LISC Jacksonville. “That triggered our interest in how LISC Jacksonville might catalyze an effort to connect people living in urban communities to nature while enhancing our region’s environmental stewardship efforts and resilience to climate change.”

While LISC Jacksonville is moving this work forward on a broader scale, the organization recently had the opportunity to put a unique twist on the concept of creative placemaking and building climate and social resilience. This summer, the organization gathered multiple partners to take schoolboys from an urban environment for an extended weekend in nature. The intended purpose is so these young-men-of-tomorrow have an ecological experience that builds their understanding of climate resilience and environmental stewardship. It also provided an experience they have likely never had before and enables them to return to their urban settings renewed, refreshed and with a transformed perspective of the world we live in – while learning new skills and also having some fun.

“This is one of many ways that we can immerse this young generation in environmental stewardship and climate resilience by creating new, meaningful experiences that they would rarely, if ever, receive in the urban neighborhoods they call home,” added Smith. “Long term, this effort showed that we can design programs that connect people to nature, ultimately translating into more educated and engaged citizens in the climate and social resilience effort while contributing to neighborhood revitalization.”

In early July, LISC Jacksonville and multiple partners organized a camping trip for 11 middle school-aged boys from the Young Men’s and Women’s Leadership Academy at Eugene J. Butler Middle School. The intended benefits of this ecologically experiential education focused on mentorship, academic support, environmental stewardship and learning about heritage at risk. 

LISC Jacksonville partnered with the Guana Tolomato Matanzas National Estuarine Research Reserve, or GTM Research Reserve, in Flagler County to host the trip. The GTM Research Reserve conducts several K-16 Education and Outreach Programs and is one of 29 National Estuarine Research Reserves around the country that focuses on research, education and stewardship.

Students enjoyed a variety of educational yet fun activities: seining, a live-animal touch session, beach clean-ups and scavenger hunts, and nature hikes. The camping occurred at Princess Place Preserve where students also did a fishing trip with Captain Sam Baker from Sol Margin Fishing & Conservation Foundation and learned about conservation and fishing protocol. The 11 boys also spent an evening at the African American Cultural Society (AACS) in Palm Coast, where they attended a dinner, educational presentation and tour of the exhibit hall. They also participated in a field trip to the Marineland Dolphin Adventure Aquarium. Among other weekend activities, the students wrapped up the trip with a sunset kayak tour followed by a tour the final day aboard the Florida Water Warriors boat of St. Augustine’s waterways.

Partners who have made the initiative possible include Edward Waters University/New Town Success Zone; GTM Research Reserve; City of Jacksonville Parks, Recreation and Community Services; Macquarie Group; Sol Margin Fishing & Conservation Foundation; and African American Cultural Society. 

“Forming these partnerships is an important step to advancing our broader work, as it catalyzed LISC Jacksonville’s recognition of our regional ecosystem and the importance of it, and how other work we’re doing in the St. Johns watershed connects to climate and social resilience,” added Smith. “There is much more to come.”