Blog
July 2024 eNews
What Tomorrow’s Scientists Are Saying Today
Sonoma Land Trust’s Conservation Council teen program is making significant strides in shaping the next generation of environmental leaders. The program’s distinctive feature is its hands-on youth-led research on our ecological preserves, combined with an in-depth education on the pathways that lead to careers in STEM and conservation. Participants are equipped with the skills, knowledge, and passion needed to make a tangible difference in their communities and beyond.
Read about Bertha Saucedo: A remarkable student and a graduate of the 2024 Conservation Council, she was interviewed about her experience with the program and how she took that experience all the way uptown to Columbia University to study environmental chemistry.
Conservation Council Program Highlights:
Hands-On Learning: Teen participants engage in real-world conservation activities, from habitat restoration to sustainable land management, providing them with tangible skills to take with them to college and beyond. They learn how to conduct field research, which can include setting up and monitoring wildlife cameras, cataloging the current data, and incorporating it with other data sources to create a comprehensive understanding of the species they are researching. They end the year by publishing scientific research in papers and posters, which they present at a showcase attended by their peers, family, land trust staff, and community members to share their findings about land management practices on ecological preserves.
Educational Workshops: The program offers a series of interactive workshops covering topics such as outdoor ethics and Honorable Harvest, the scientific method, wildlife conservation, sustainable practices, and the importance of preserving natural landscapes. Field trips to science laboratories such as the Bodega Marine Lab and the UC Davis college campus augment their education with subject matter experts who can answer their questions and offer more guidance tailored to their research project.
Community Engagement: By fostering a sense of environmental responsibility, the program encourages young people to take active roles in their communities, promoting a culture of stewardship and conservation. The members graduate with a deeper connection to themselves, their peers, and the greater field of environmental sciences.
Career Paths: Conservation Council Members participate in a Career Expo organized by Sonoma Land Trust and the Youth Development Committee of the Sonoma Environmental Education Collaborative (SEEC) where they learn about the vast array of science and conservation opportunities. They are provided one-on-one assistance with developing their student resume for college applications and are provided access to a custom Discord community created by Sonoma Land Trust program leaders that includes a knowledge base of higher education programs, financial resources, and articles on how to pursue a career that interests them.
The program is getting high marks:
Graduates from 2020-2023 that were surveyed shared:
- 100% said they had an increased awareness of STEM careers
- 80% Believe they can be a scientist or conservationists if they want to
- 75% increased their likelihood to pursue a career in conservation, others already knew what they wanted to pursue or decided it wasn’t for them
- 100% Learned about protected lands and their importance
- 91% increased their interest in science and conservation
- 73% understand more about the paths to becoming a conservationist and/or STEM professional
2024’s class added:
- 100% – understand more about the paths to becoming a conservationist and/or STEM professional
- 89% learned about STEM or a conservation career that interested them
Bringing families together, in nature
We’re celebrating the fifth anniversary of Sonoma Land Trust’s bilingual Familias al Aire Libre / Families Outdoors program with refreshed activities, locations, and increased capacity to bring more families out on the land. What remains the same is the heart of the program: exploring the biodiversity of Sonoma County with a community of friends and families.
On the fourth Saturday of each month, families meet at the Sonoma Land Trust office, buckle into a transport van, and set off to a public park or protected land for a day of nature exploration and activities that are fun and inclusive for children of all ages. These free outings are hosted in Spanish and translated into English, meeting a local need for more guided nature experiences dedicated to and designed with Latine families in mind.
For children, a connection to nature goes far beyond cultivating the next generation of environmental stewards. Spending time outdoors has many developmental benefits, including improved physical and mental health, boosted creativity and imagination, better attention and focus, development of social and sensory skills, and more. Recreating together in nature is a way for families and communities to bond, but access to the outdoors isn’t always equal. One significant barrier to guided outdoor recreation is language, which Familias al Aire Libre aims to remedy.
A collaborative effort for the community
Sonoma Land Trust launched the bilingual program in April 2019 in partnership with Vía Esperanza, Community Action Network’s (CAN) family resource center. Public Programs Manager Ingrid Stearns underscored the significant role Vía Esperanza’s former Program Manager, Mike Varela, and the organization played in launching the program: “We followed their lead on program design, and they reached out to their existing program participants to join us on the monthly hikes.” The benefits of bilingual programming were seen immediately with Ingrid sharing, “If we present in Spanish, a lot more people get involved in discussions and asking questions.”
After four months, Varela moved out of the area and Sonoma Land Trust worked to keep the program going. However, soon after, the COVID-19 pandemic began and in-person programming including outings were forced to go on a hiatus. As not to lose the momentum of a fledgling program, we enlisted the support of Luz Huerta, a passionate nature-lover and organizer of CAN’s Pasitos Playgroup, a parent-child program focused on preparing for success in kindergarten and beyond. She was instrumental in keeping the program going through the pandemic and nurturing it into what it is today; Luz worked to organize participants for one of our first Spanish virtual hikes in 2022 and supported the re-launching of in-person outings once it was safe to do so again.
Her dedication to making connections with nature goes beyond her professional role and is part of who she is. Luz loves Sonoma County, and shared that she “feels blessed to live in this place surrounded by beautiful landscapes and places [she] never would have imagined existing.” She and her husband Cornelio made it a priority to spend time with their children together in nature, citing this as a reason they have a great love of the outdoors today. Their son Daniel enjoys planting his own fruit and vegetables in the community garden, and their daughter Leslie, a former Sonoma Land Trust Conservation Council Member, is now studying zoology and environmental science in college.
In March of this year, Carlos Rivas joined Sonoma Land Trust as the new Outings Coordinator. He has brought new energy to the Familias al Aire Libre program, revitalizing it with his extensive experience in youth outdoor education, bilingual language skills, community outreach and engagement, and a personal passion for sharing nature with others, especially his young son.
Sharing a passion across generations
Familias al Aire Libre is more than monthly outings, but a welcoming space that families return to again and again. Héctor Camacho and Lucy Díaz’s family was first connected to the program through their son Héctor’s participation in the Pasitos program. They met Carlos when he came to the class to introduce the bilingual outings program, and they immediately signed up, sharing that “it has been wonderful from the first moment.”
Lucy says the Familias al Aire Libre outings give their family the opportunity to take a break and spend quality time together, something that doesn’t often happen with the many commitments and activities of everyday life. Héctor and Lucy, both born in the state of Michoacan, Mexico, share a love of the outdoors that started in childhood. The couple has seen this carry over into their children as they’ve grown up, not just in Héctor (5) but also Bricia (10), Ailinn (18), and Daniel (22).
The community aspect of the program makes Héctor and Lucy’s family feel welcome and comfortable, and they’re always excited to learn something with the Sonoma Land Trust team, whether it’s a new animal or insect to observe or an activity like clay painting. Héctor and Lucy have seen their children “waiting for the moment to feel free in nature,” with Bricia sharing, “I just love to feel the wind. I would rather be in nature than playing with my toys!”
Sonoma Land Trust creates programs that strengthen the community’s connection to nature and each other. Learn more about Familias al Aire Libre on our website.
A Force for Nature Spotlight: Miles Horton
Miles Horton was drawn to Sonoma County for a reason many of us share – access to the outdoors. “I wanted to be somewhere I could walk out my door and be on a trail, running, hiking, or going to the beach,” he explained. Miles moved to Santa Rosa from Sacramento in December of last year, after seven years working in policy at the Capitol. A self-described “fanatical bird watcher,” he shares that his time here so far “has been amazing, exploring our local public lands like Trione-Annadel State Park and Taylor Mountain Regional Park, and spotting bird species that have been on [his] list for a while.”
Miles had first learned of Sonoma Land Trust from our advocacy work at the State Capitol. Working for Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, who supports policy around conservation, climate change, and natural working lands, he saw the importance of this work firsthand. Last year, he was formally introduced to the organization by former Land Trust board member Gymmel Trembly who invited him to an informational event in Petaluma.
Miles felt that much of the conservation policy he saw in Sacramento lacked a critical next step – how the land being protected would be managed for climate change resilience. Miles recently attended a Sonoma Land Trust outing at the San Pablo Baylands, where he met some of our team members and learned about land management practices like wetland restoration to combat sea level rise, which he felt were often missing at the state policy level.
In addition to his hobbies and personal values aligning with Sonoma Land Trust’s mission, Miles’ career intersects with the work we’re doing. He’s the Legislative Policy & Community Engagement Manager at Sonoma Clean Power, drawn to the organization as a young professional looking to have an impact on his community because it not only provides clean power to Sonoma County, but also serves as a vehicle to enact local climate priorities.
Sonoma Clean Power currently provides over 90% clean energy to customers, and they are working hard to close the gap for that last 10% through their new GeoZone initiative, a project Miles is particularly excited about. He explains, “This ‘next generation’ of geothermal power can run around the clock, is resilient in the face of heat waves and natural disasters, uses significantly less water than conventional geothermal power, and has a much smaller footprint than solar or wind power,” preserving the rich biodiversity and landscapes of Sonoma County.
In addition to working on clean energy and climate bills, Miles interfaces with the community about projects like GeoZone, answering questions, meeting with organizations and community groups to get their feedback and lay the groundwork for collaboration, and ensuring benefits are local, like the creation of highly skilled, well-paying jobs that are stable even when global energy markets fluctuate. SCP’s mission is to combat climate change, and they’re looking at what they can do to have a broader impact beyond Sonoma County, with the hope that this new clean energy technology is eventually adopted around the world.
Miles is a member of Sonoma Land Trust because he is impressed by our approach to facing the dual challenges of climate change and biodiversity loss. He appreciates that the Land Trust is “going out and doing” the work, jumping in with both feet to take bold and swift action to address these problems and “paving the way” for managing lands for climate resilience. He’s amazed by the community here in Sonoma County, the shared love and care for the outdoors, conservation, and stewardship, and is excited to be a part of it!
Good Fire Notification
Prescribed burns are one way we’re restoring our natural ecosystems, and it’s important to us to keep our community informed. Before each burn, we display roadside signage notifications, contact adjacent neighbors, post alerts on social media and on the Watchduty app, and issue press releases with details and maps.
Now, you can receive smoke notifications for prescribed burns conducted on Sonoma Land Trust properties straight to your inbox. Learn more and sign up here.
A Force for Nature
Thank you for being A Force for Nature! We are so grateful for your support over the last six years of this campaign. Your generosity has enabled us to fund conservation of the land and natural resources and prepare ourselves for the impacts of a changing climate. From the launch of the campaign in 2018, thousands of people joined together to support the work of our strategic plan – protecting nearly 9,000 acres and completing 14 impactful conservation projects to ensure Sonoma County’s land, people, and water can thrive.
Learn more about the impact of A Force for Nature
Language of the Land: Art in the Landscape
What’s one way we can savor the magnificent abundance of Sonoma County landscapes? Through art! Learning to sketch or paint from nature deepens our relationship to the land. Please join us online for a fun and playful art workshop with Elizabeth McKoy of the Petaluma nonprofit creativity center Artaluma. She’ll lead us in putting our pencils, pens, and paintbrushes to paper to capture the beauty of the outdoors. This workshop will be guided by play and exploration, and is for anyone and everyone.
Spanish interpretation will be available.
Free Outings
Join us out in nature this month! We’re hosting a series of urban creek walks and sunset hikes, as well as our monthly bilingual Familias al Aire Libre/Families Outdoors outing. Learn more and register on our website.
Many of these hikes are in partnership with Sonoma County Ag + Open Space.
Ologies is a comedic science show that dives deep into anything “-ology” with diverse cohosts, ologists, that are experts in their fields of study. It’s an excellent way to laugh and learn about a wide array of topics. Ward’s smologies segments are shorter versions that are kid friendly! Each ologist chooses a charitable organization that receives a portion of the podcast’s ad revenue. I recommend listening to Foraging Ecology with Alexis Nikole Nelson (@BlackForager), Ethnoecology with Leigh Joseph (Squamish), Indigenous Fire Ecology with Dr. Amy Christianson (Métis), and Native Melittology (Bees) with Krystle Hickman.
