Posts Tagged ‘ashokan center’

Stream Explorers Youth Adventure 2021 Registration is Open

Posted on: April 27th, 2021 by Brent Gotsch

The Ashokan Water­shed Stream Man­age­ment Pro­gram (AWSMP) is excit­ed to announce that reg­is­tra­tion for the Stream Explor­ers 2021 Youth Adven­ture is now open! Stream Explor­ers is an excit­ing day-long sci­ence-based pro­gram for youth in grades 3 through 7 resid­ing in the Ashokan Reser­voir Water­shed (this includes the Towns of Hur­ley, Olive, Shan­dak­en and Wood­stock in Ulster Coun­ty and the Towns of Hunter and Lex­ing­ton in Greene Coun­ty). This year’s event will be held on Sat­ur­day, June 5 from 8:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. at the Ashokan Cen­ter locat­ed at 477 Beaverkill Road in Olive­bridge, NY. Reg­is­ter online today at www.tinyurl.com/streamexplorers2021.

Stream Explor­ers is a fun-filled day full of stream-themed activ­i­ties. Par­tic­i­pants will use sci­ence mod­els to learn how streams work and to assess stream health. We will play water­shed-relat­ed games, learn how nature fil­ters water, and explore the Eso­pus Gorge. A hearty bag-lunch and morn­ing and after­noon snacks will be pro­vid­ed. Youth are encour­aged to be pre­pared for a vari­ety of weath­er con­di­tions so dress in lay­ers, bring an all-weath­er jack­et and wear closed-toed shoes. It is also encour­aged to bring a pair of water-proof muck boots. Bring sun­screen and insect repel­lant. Watch our video on a pre­vi­ous Stream Explor­ers Youth Adven­ture to see some of the activities.

We have sev­er­al mea­sures in place to keep par­tic­i­pants safe from Covid-19. We are lim­it­ing reg­is­tra­tion to the first 40 par­tic­i­pants. Youth will be fur­ther divid­ed into small­er groups of 10 and inter­ac­tion with oth­er groups will be lim­it­ed. It will be manda­to­ry for all par­tic­i­pants to wear a mask while indoors or with­in 6 feet of one anoth­er. If mate­ri­als are to be shared, par­tic­i­pants will be required to wear gloves (that will be pro­vid­ed) and com­mon sur­faces will be dis­in­fect­ed reg­u­lar­ly. Unlike in pre­vi­ous years we will not be eat­ing a buf­fet lunch in the din­ing hall. Bag lunch­es will be sub­sti­tut­ed and we will eat with our subgroups.

Space is lim­it­ed and we expect to fill up quick­ly so reg­is­ter as soon as pos­si­ble at www.tinyurl.com/streamexplorers2021. Any ques­tions relat­ed to the Stream Explor­ers Youth Adven­ture can be direct­ed to Matt Savat­gy at mjs593@cornell.edu or Brent Gotsch at bwg37@cornell.edu or call 845–688-3047 ext. 103. 

Share

Watershed Detectives Club Is Off To A Great Start

Posted on: October 22nd, 2020 by Brent Gotsch
A scene from the inau­gur­al ses­sion of the 2020 Water­shed Detec­tives Pro­gram held at the Ashokan Cen­ter. Pho­to by Matt Helffrich

The ongo­ing COVID-19 pan­dem­ic has forced many events and activ­i­ties to be can­celled or switched to an online for­mat and for good rea­son. Tra­di­tion­al school­ing for many stu­dents in the water­shed has moved online ful­ly or in a hybrid of online and lim­it­ed in-per­son teach­ing. Most after­school activ­i­ties on school grounds have been can­celled indef­i­nite­ly. Sad­ly, because of this there is a dearth of oppor­tu­ni­ties for extracur­ric­u­lar activ­i­ties around most sub­jects, though espe­cial­ly sci­ence edu­ca­tion. While the con­cern about the safe­ty of in-per­son edu­ca­tion is war­rant­ed, there are ways to hold in-per­son edu­ca­tion that reduces the risk of expo­sure to the virus. In an effort to pro­vide alter­na­tive pro­gram oppor­tu­ni­ties and to get stu­dents safe­ly engaged in a stream-based and water­shed cur­ricu­lum, AWSMP has relaunched our pop­u­lar Water­shed Detec­tives Pro­gram with added safe­ty features.

Water­shed Detec­tives has tra­di­tion­al­ly been an after­school pro­gram held at the Ben­nett Inter­me­di­ate School in Boiceville for grades 4–6. This year, instead of being held on school grounds the pro­gram is being offered at the Ashokan Cen­ter in near­by Olive­bridge, NY and for stu­dents in grades 4–8. Hold­ing the pro­gram at the Ashokan Cen­ter allows for good phys­i­cal dis­tanc­ing between stu­dents and access to the Ashokan Center’s numer­ous trails, streams and forests for learn­ing and dis­cov­ery. Sev­er­al safe­ty pro­to­cols have been put in place along with strict san­i­ta­tion pro­ce­dures to reduce the pos­si­bil­i­ty of infec­tion. While the loca­tion has changed the same great pro­gram­ming is tak­ing place where stu­dents will learn about the impor­tance of streams, water­sheds, and ripar­i­an areas.

“It has def­i­nite­ly been a chal­lenge get­ting this year’s pro­gram up and run­ning, but we have a sol­id plan in place in an effort to keep things run­ning smooth­ly,” says Matt Savat­gy, AWSMP Youth Edu­ca­tor and leader of the Water­shed Detective’s Pro­gram. “The kids are real­ly enjoy­ing being togeth­er, out­doors with their friends and are active­ly engaged in learn­ing to become stew­ards for our watershed.”

Cur­rent­ly, the pro­gram is full. How­ev­er, AWSMP hopes to have more youth and adult pro­grams in the com­ing months. Please reg­u­lar­ly check our web­page for upcom­ing events and pro­grams offered both online and in-person.

The 2020 Water­shed Detec­tives Emblem
Share