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I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I projects, bird banding, radio telemetry, bird house projects, water quality studies, ecological health studies, and reintroduction of rare and endangered species. Students can apply their activities over a wide range of disciplines. Science classes will benefit from experimental projects and art classes can use the area for landscape drawings, paintings, or photography. Literature and English classes can use the area as a basis for nature storytelling and writing. Stillwater Environmental Learning Center An example of a successful Environmental Learning Center (ELC) is located at Stillwater Area High School. This natural area encompasses 52 acres adjacent to the high school. The area is a medley of ponds, wetlands, a mature oak forest, aspen forest, and stands of spruce, pine, and mixed hardwoods. These areas provide a variety of habitats for wildlife such as deer, fox, geese, songbirds, and others. The Environmental Learning Center also includes trails, floating docks, seating nodes, and an amphitheater (Board of the Environmental Learning Center, 1995). Students are heavily involved in the Stillwater ELC. According to the Profile on the Stillwater Environmental Learning Center written by the Board of the ELC, students spent over 14,000 hours at the ELC during the 1994-95 school year. The students participate in small animal trapping, nest monitoring, vegetation identification, invertebrate studies, and water quality testing. High school students also use the ELC to teach elementary students about nature. Every year, Andy Weaver, a science teacher at Stillwater High School, requires his class to conduct a stewardship project in the ELC. Through these projects, students learn to take ownership in their ELC and according to Weaver, take great pride in the ELC. The ELC is also useful for Art and English classes. English teacher, Dave Olufson, has his students write about what it feels like to be in nature. He challenges his students to "look, listen, feel and otherwise attempt to form different impressions of their 'spot' of wildemess,"(Uhlig, 1996). Olufson states that, "based on the notion that students learn by doing and hands-on activities have a greater impact in the mind than lectures and reading, the center allows teachers to go beyond the textbooks into the real world," (Uhlig, 1996). Teachers of the Stillwater Area High School created the Environmental Learning Center out of a desire to provide a greater learning experience than is possible in a standard classroom. A group of teachers participate on the Board of the ELC and funds are received from Christmas tree sales and outside grants. The high school has been successful in raising funding for the ELC with a minimal cost to the school district. 19