Chattermarks

Sixteen high school students hailing from Oregon and Washington arrived in the North Cascades on June 26th to begin an unforgettable adventure. These young leaders came to participate in the third year of Cascades Climate Challenge, one of North Cascades Institute’s youth programs. The youth started off by splitting into two groups to go on 12-day backpacking and canoeing trips on and around Ross Lake. For many, this was the longest time away from home, the first time paddling a canoe, and the most physically challenging experience they have had.

CCC2 stands on a bridge over rushing Lightning Creek

CCC1 canoers “raft up” in the mouth of Devil’s Creek

Students learned many new skills each day, in addition to lessons about climate change, invasive species, presenting and naturalizing. Everyone took turns cooking meals, cleaning up following Leave No Trace guidelines, building fires, and leading the group. Spending so much time in North Cascades National Park (NCNP) provided a great opportunity for hands-on service work, and a chance for the students to give back to the park they were learning and living in. Mike Brondi, volunteer coordinator for NCNP, met up with both groups to teach them about invasive reed canary grass, which the students pulled in order to promote native grass growth. They also planted native seeds to restore the banks of Dry Creek and cleared the trail between Hozomeen and Willow Lakes.

Members of CCC1 manage to fit six people in a bear box

Students took turns cleaning up after each meal

Each group’s 12-day trip included waking up at 5am one morning to climb up Desolation Peak, gaining breathtaking views of snow and glacier-capped mountains, at the expense of one thousand vertical feet per mile. Youth who had been strangers on the first day supported each other like family, encouraging one another to the top of the mountain. This was just one of innumerable moments of awe and inspiration on the trips: listening to eerie loon calls at Hozomeen Lake, paddling silently to the mouth of Devil’s Creek, or holding 20,000 year old pieces of wood flattened by glaciers, preserved in clay next to the Skagit River.

Canoes float below Desolation Peak, about to paddle their hikers to the Desolation trailhead

CCC2 poses in triumph, with Jack Mountain and Ross Lake as a backdrop

After the two smaller groups completed their “backcountry” trips, they reunited at the Learning Center for the luxuries of “front country” camping, and ten days of focusing more intently on the science of climate change and its impacts on the North Cascades. Students met with specialists like NCNP geologist, Jon Riedel, to learn how climate change is affecting the park’s glaciers, Gina DiCiccio, NCNP climate change intern, and Katie Fleming from the Cool School Challenge. Their lessons allowed students to explore a variety of ecosystems, including Baker Lake, Baker River, Thunder Knob, Rainy Lake and Diablo Dam powerhouse.

By the end of the trip, students were experts at tent construction

Students hiked the still-snowy trail to breathtaking Rainy Lake for lessons about glacial landforms

After some rainy nights camping at Newhalem campground, resulting in the overnight formation of tent lakes, the group returned to the Learning Center for their culminating project: putting together an hour-long presentation and lessons on their experience, what they learned and how the students will be applying their new knowledge when they return home. The students shared this with the Kinship Conservation Fellows, a group of eighteen international leaders who are actively working to integrate a practice of conservation and environmental awareness into business. The students in turn got to learn about some of the kinds of jobs they could pursue to help preserve the environment they are so passionate about.

A student snorkels in Ross Lake, looking for small red-sided shiner fish

Twenty-two days after these sixteen students first came to the Cascades, they had to find a way to say goodbye to both a place and a community that had become a home and a family. As instructors, we hope that the students left with as much inspiration and confidence as they gave us. Getting to teach, lead, and mentor such exceptional young adults is a privilege. Spending three full weeks 24/7 watching these youth grow individually and as a group is a process that, while exhausting, is simultaneously one of the most rewarding experiences an educator can have. These bright-eyed and enthusiastic youth remind me of myself at a younger age, which gives me hope that they will continue becoming leaders that will not settle for “business as usual” and a planet that cannot support the systems and amazing organisms we cherish. NCNP maintenance foreman Gerry Cook shared the following words with the members of Cascades Climate Challenge, which they have all taken to heart: “I cannot change the world, but I can change the world around me. And if we change the world around us, we will change the world.”

The North Cascades Institute Staff and Graduate students have spent weeks packing food, preparing curriculum, shuttling canoes, calling students, organizing camping gear and finalizing lessons in preparation for the first of two Cascades Climate Challenge Programs.  On June 29th twenty students from around the Pacific Northwest met for the first time at Sea-Tac Airport to began their three week journey through the North Cascades.

The first few days have been full of nerves, laughs, smiles and lots of questions as the group prepared for their first camping experience with their new community. Already these students have learned how to set up camp, use different types of media to capture their experience, explored trails on their own, and met with North Cascades National Park scientists and rangers focusing their attention on the impacts of climate change on this alpine ecosystem.

» Continue reading Introducing the 2010 Cascades Climate Challenge Team!! (Part 1)

How big is your social network? Use your e-powers for good and help Cascades Climate Challenge win a grant! Go to the  Brighter Planet Project Fund and vote up to 3 times. If we get the most votes, we win $5000.

The money will be used to buy new tents (our current ones aren’t going to make it through the summer), school bus fees (many school districts don’t have field trips because they can’t afford to hire the buses) and supplies for the students (we supply everything the students need for the summer—socks, long underwear, boots, water bottles, raingear, warm fleece, hats—you name it.)

Voting closes June 15, so please spread the word to everyone you know!

Photo (Above) Two Climate Challenge students enjoy Baker Lake in July.

For those of you following the progression of the Parks Climate Challenge 2009 participants, you will be glad to hear that the talented and empowered youth are in the process of fulfilling the third stage of this incredible new program. PCC students around the country are creating, implementing and leading service projects focused on engaging youth in their home communities on the issue of climate change in collaboration with a local National Park and Elementary School. On November 3rd, with the faithful guidance of North Cascades National Park, North Cascades Institute and Seattle Parks and Recreation, the five motivated students haling from the Seattle area facilitated an education field trip to Carkeek Park for over 80 rambunctious elementary students. Laura Humes, Sydney Jarol, Yvonne Chan, Sarah Salvador and Heather McPherson used their knowledge and leadership to inspire 4th/5th graders from from Parkwood, Whittier and Echo Lake Elementary Schools on a beautiful day in Seattle.

» Continue reading Taking the Lead

The days of the hand-scrawled essay may be gone, but students still are telling stories to their peers, families and teachers about their summer experiences. We are pleased to be able to showcase two videos put together by members of the 2009 Parks Climate Challenge team. The first, by Laura Humes, is a testament to the power of her experience in the North Cascades. The second, by Sydney Jarol, was selected for honorable mention by KCTS in their My Parks! Digital Storytelling competition.

You know it’s serious business when you get a list outlining several different dress codes for the upcoming trip. Last week the Parks Climate Challenge team continued their odyssey, this time meeting in Washington D.C., where they substituted swimsuits for sport coats, hiking boots for heels, and PFDs for neckties. (See a “before” photo here.)

Colin, Jordan and Hannah prepare energy-saving kits.

Audrey and Yvonne plant seeds with students from Cesar Chavez Public Charter school.

Less than 24 hours after arriving, the students led other youth in a service project on the National Mall (radio story here), attended a reception on Capitol Hill, presented to Federal Agency representatives and met with Robert Stanton, Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Interior for Policy Management and Budget. In between engagements the students did some sightseeing, continued planning and developing their service projects and caught up with each other.

PCC students rehearse their presentations for the Federal agency representatives.

Somehow in the midst of prepping for DC, working on the upcoming service project and heading back to school, Sydney found time to create an entry for the KCTS Digital Storytelling Competition and won honorable mention!

Donya, Sydney and Araceli work the room.

“We are going to change the world”

They climbed up steep mountain trails into clouds; toured a dam powerhouse; bathed in freezing snowmelt streams; canoed across white-capped lakes; withstood a heat wave; taught fifth-graders about climate change; walked through old forest fire burns; sat out a lightning storm on Desolation Peak; interviewed scientists, rangers, firefighters, journalists and rodeo-watchers; and sang, hiked, documented and laughed their way across North Cascades National Park.

With many surprises, discoveries and ‘firsts’, the inaugural Parks Climate Challenge team completed the field phase of their experience in great style. After 33 days in the North Cascades studying climate change, what do the Parks Climate Challenge students have to say?

“We’re the ones who are going to influence the next generation. Once we get on track, they’re going to follow suit.”

“It’s our lifetime now and we’re the ones that are going to have to live with it. If we start early, then by the time we’re adults, we’ll be able to do something.”

“We are going to change the world.”