Washington, D.C. – Project Learning Tree (PLT), the national environmental education program of the American Forest Foundation, announced that it will fund 33 projects that engage students in service-learning projects that improve the environment of their schools and surrounding communities. The projects address community needs, provide opportunities for student leadership, connect to classroom curriculum, and involve the local community.

"By integrating service into the curriculum, students are learning about environmental and social issues in a real-life context," said Al Stenstrup, Director of Education Programs for the American Forest Foundation. "From gardening with native plants to building outdoor classrooms for their schools, these kids are researching and planning action projects that enable them to apply their knowledge and develop critical thinking skills to solve real-world problems related to the environment."

PLT’s GreenWorks! program provides merit-based grants to schools and groups that work with youth, empowering them to create gardens, plant trees, restore streams and wildlife habitat, improve energy efficiency, and more. The projects range from a garden to attract native pollinators in Hawaii, to a sugarhouse to make maple syrup in Maine, to a conservation area to restore threatened game birds in Pennsylvania. Since 1992, more than $800,000 has funded nearly 1,000 GreenWorks! projects across the country.

The 33 grants announced by PLT today include the following:

• In San Francisco, pre-K through teenagers involved with the Embarcadero YMCA will plan, develop, and maintain a garden on the rooftop of the Y building. In addition to the environmental benefits of the vegetation, the youth will harvest vegetables for the local community.
  
  
• In Calvert County, MD, second-graders will investigate the recycling habits of residents and help kick off a recycling program in every elementary school in their school district.
  
  
• In Jacksboro, TN, seventh- and eighth-graders will help build a nature trail adjacent to downtown. Their role is to learn about and plant native vegetation, as well as how to work with city officials and community groups.
  
  
• In San Antonio, TX, students in grades six though eight at Tejada Middle School will form a "GREEN" club to help their school go green through composting, recycling, and beautifying the grounds.

GreenWorks! grants, ranging from $250 to $5,000, for service-learning projects are made available to educators who have attended a PLT professional development workshop and received training in environmental education and PLT curriculum materials. PLT’s 50-state network trains 30,000 PreK-12 educators every year through 1,500 workshops held across the country. For more information and a full list of grants awarded, visit www.plt.org.

 

About Project Learning Tree
Project Learning Tree® is a program of the American Forest Foundation, a nonprofit conservation organization that works to ensure decision makers and educators, both today and tomorrow, understand and value the role that forests and the environment play in our lives. Through quality environmental education and outdoor learning for children and adults across the country, and in conjunction with our 50-state network of partners and volunteers, our programs are engaging youth and communities in conservation efforts, growing healthy forests, and conserving habitat. For more information, visit www.forestfoundation.org.

PLT provides environmental education training and PLT curriculum materials to 30,000 PreK-12 educators every year through 1,500 professional development workshops held in communities across the country. PLT teaches students about complex environmental issues, and helps students learn the skills they need to make sound choices about the environment. PLT’s GreenSchools! and GreenWorks! service-learning programs engage students with their community to apply their learning in a real-life context.

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