ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION Brochure 2

Pine Mountain Settlement School
Series 22: Environmental Education
Brochure 2
Sketches by Mary Rogers
Signed by Burton Rogers
December 1971

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TAGS: Environmental Education brochure, Mary Rogers’ illustrations, environmentalism, community school, National Park Service, National Audubon Society, T.V.A., environmental classes, needs, EKU students, Burton Rogers

ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION Brochure 2

The Environmental Education program at Pine Mountain Settlement School officially began in 1972, carrying on one of the School’s educational missions since its founding. Throughout its 100+ years, the School consistently incorporated environmentalism in its curriculum to remind staff and students of their beautiful and fragile shared environment.

The following brochure was one of two designed to introduce schools to the Environmental Education program at PMSS. The illustrations on the front cover and the last page were done by Mary Rogers, a PMSS staff member from 1942 until 1993 and wife of PMSS Director Burton Rogers. These are some of many delightful drawings by Mary Rogers, each conveying the spirit of Pine Mountain Settlement School.

TRANSCRIPTION

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Pine Mountain Settlement School
Pine Mountain, Kentucky 40864

[Illustration of children and an adult on a path through the woods.]

Into the woods on a bright November day streams an exhilarated crowd of third graders. This group of six is charged with seeing how many kinds of mosses they can find, that group is looking out for ferns, another collects seeds, another twigs, another makes rubbings of tree bark, looking in wonder as different patterns emerge. Everywhere are cries of “isn’t it beautiful!” Other treasures are noted — the split rock through which they…

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…can squeeze, the chestnut tunnel, the puff balls, the strands of molds on rotting logs. One sits firmly on the pinnacle of a rock when we call her to come to lunch and says, “I want to stay here and listen.” “Do you think we can come here again and spend the day when we go to the new school?” — a group wholly alive, wholly happy, curious and alert.

Is there some way to preserve and develop in children that sense of being in tune with the created world? Pine Mountain has set itself to the task of providing this opportunity, and dedicated itself to evolving the skills to help children grow into adults who love and cherish the community of living things and do not seek to exploit and destroy it.

Although the unexpected delay in opening the new school down the valley has called us to serve the community in this emergency, given us more than double the number of children to care for, filled our buildings and made inroads on the time and strength of Pine Mountain workers, we have pushed on as steadily as we can to prepare for our new program of Environmental Education. During the summer we worked with a church youth…

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…camp here, we visited other centers of environmental education developed by organizations such as the National Park Service, National Audubon Society, and T.V.A., to study their programs and methods. We have been building up our resources of books, pamphlets, magazine files and equipment. When the day school students filled our premises, we started environmental classes with them: a five-week study of water, a class on caves, with outdoor observation and experimentation. Our West Wind building has been remodeled as a dormitory for groups who come to stay.

Could friends of Pine Mountain help us with the following equipment (new or used)?
16 mm. movie projector
film strip projector
chain saw
hand lenses (magnifying)
thermometers (soil, air, and max-min)
carbide lights
telescope
microscopes
microgram scale
aquarium(s)
binoculars
compasses
canteens
rain ponchos
tape recorder (7″ reel)
back copies of Audubon, National Wildlife,
Ranger Rick, and other Nature Magazines.

The new young director of the Environmental Education program has been actively on the…

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…job since the beginning of October, making contacts, planning and operating outdoor classes, laying out trails and constructing them with help from students of Eastern Kentucky University, and even teaching scouts technical rock climbing.

In the space of a brief letter it is impossible to share with you as we would wish many details of how we hope the future program will develop when we are free to go forward. We hope to have classes of children, with their teachers and maybe parents, here for a day, or staying with us for a week, primarily from our own and neighboring counties. We want to give them the outdoor work and learning for which their interests and capabilities so well fit them, and to encourage them to be aware and proud of their mountain heritage through folk dance, songs, and crafts. We hope to receive church groups, scouts, all who are genuinely interested in what we have to offer. Our priority is children, first elementary school age, then high school. Would we take children from outside the area? Yes, for the mountains have much to teach them. College age? We have already had one college group on a study visit. Adults? We have already had teachers from a…

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…neighboring county on our trails studying to prepare a pilot unit on forest communities. We also hope for youth leaders and church workers.

We have “heart and cravin'” that this program will develop and bear fruit. How dare we think that we can finance it?

As always in time of great need in the past Pine Mountain shares its dream with those friends who have faithfully helped us over and over again to meet the demands — when “new occasions teach new duties, time makes ancient good uncouth” — trusting that you will share with us in realizing this dream.

[Signed] Burton Rogers
Dec. 1971

[Illustration of a magnolia flower.]