The Student Conservation Association Annual Report 2007 Annual Report 2007 1 2 Student Conservation Association A lever for moving the world. The power to save the planet. For 50 years, the volunteers of the Student Conservation Association have preserved national parks, restored ailing lands, and left a wondrous collective legacy on the American landscape. Their mission – indeed, the youth conservation movement – started with the brilliantly simple idea of Elizabeth Cushman Titus Putnam, then a recent college graduate herself. Liz’s 1955 senior thesis introduced the concept of a “Student Conservation Corps” and over the past half-century, SCA has become a living, breathing how-to manual for engaging young people in the practice of stewardship. Today, amid climate change, urbanization, and “nature-deficit disorder,” SCA is writing important new chapters in conservation. The contemporary challenges facing our planet demand that we broaden our environmental efforts, even as we continue to serve our treasured parks and forests. Thus SCA is unleashing bold new strategies that will mark our next 50 years by… • Bringing sustainable, green practices to communities in need… • Connecting young people of every background to the land around them, and… • Instilling a modern ethic of stewardship that will guide a new generation. SCA doesn’t just take a stand – we take action. From mountain trails to Main Streets, and from seashores to city schools, SCA is redefining conservation all across our nation. Annual Report 2007 3 A letter from the chairman It is inspiring to realize, more than five decades later, that what started as two teams of students in Grand Teton and Olympic National Parks has evolved today into the nation’s most powerful conservation service force. SCA’s golden anniversary in 2007 offered many opportunities to celebrate and reaffirm our organizational values. One of my most memorable moments occurred when SCA’s board of directors adjourned our summer meeting in Seattle to grab picks and Pulaskis and aid the restoration effort at storm-ravaged Mount Rainier. We worked alongside dozens of dedicated SCA volunteers and, together, re-routed a badly damaged trail. It was a tremendously powerful experience. All of us were lifted by the passion of the young people with whom we served, and awed by their ability to affect change and stewardship when they were so desperately needed. Clearly, after half a century, SCA’s mission still resonates and I would suggest it is now more important than ever. Yet in so many ways, we are just getting started. In this report, you will see an SCA that is expanding its impact on both our environment and our people. We are a progressive organization that continues to blaze new trails through innovation, collaboration and a deep commitment to conservation service. SCA Mission Statement: Simply stated, SCA is all about Our Land, Our Youth, To build the next generation and Our Future. of conservation leaders and SCA’s past and future success is entirely due to the great people who facilitate and execute the organization’s mission. I am grateful inspire lifelong stewardship of to my dedicated colleagues on the SCA Board of Directors and to our environment and communities sunsetting board members Stephen Bartram, Paula Cleary, Robert G. Stanton, and Ellen Spencer Susman. I commend SCA by engaging young people in President Dale Penny and his outstanding staff. I also salute all our highly supportive resource management partners. hands-on service to the land. I thank you, our generous sponsors and donors, and pledge that SCA will always conduct itself in ways that are worthy of your enduring faith and trust. And finally, I thank our selfless volunteers. With your support, SCA will continue to make a difference in the places and on the conservation issues that matter most. Fred Prescott Chairman 4 Student Conservation Association A letter from the president With SCA’s 50th Anniversary year now completed, we are able to assess fully the accomplishments of our first half century: • 50,000+ high school and college-aged young people have served to preserve our environment • 26 million hours (that’s more than 3 million work days) of hands-on conservation service restoring and preserving millions of acres of wildlands • Tens of thousands of SCA alumni are now environmental professionals with thousands more serving as volunteer conservation leaders in their home communities Are we proud of these accomplishments? Of course. Yet… As we launch SCA’s next 50 years, our planet is at a critical moment. Climate change wreaks its impact around the globe. Public lands are more threatened than ever. Larger, more diverse populations are often living in unhealthy urban environments. Too many children are growing up without meaningful interactions with the natural world. And successors must be prepared to follow in the footsteps of the environmental community’s established leadership. So, how should SCA respond to these complex contemporary issues? Well, we’ve recently asked ourselves that same question and developed a bold vision that builds on our decades of national This Annual Report goes beyond the highlights of 2007. It underscores leadership in youth conservation service. Over the next five years the vital leadership roles – both traditional and new – that SCA SCA will inspire hundreds of thousands of young Americans to answer members will play in the future in our parks, schools and communities. the call to preserve our planet fueled by three overarching strategies: I thank you and the many thousands of other supporters who have • Preserve Parks, Forests and Wildlands – by doubling the number contributed this past year to enable our young people to serve. of young people serving in SCA programs on public lands across Without you, SCA would simply not be sustained. Thanks also to our country our many resource management partners. I also want to recognize the SCA Board of Directors, under Chairman Fred Prescott’s leadership, • Conserve America’s Urban Green Spaces – by launching or for their guidance, as well as the management and staff who make it expanding programs in at least 25 US cities, ensuring conservation all happen. And, especially as we culminate our 50th Anniversary, we is relevant to today’s increasingly diverse young population thank our founder, Elizabeth Cushman Titus Putnam, for her vision, • Prepare the Next Generation of Conservation Leaders – by passion and ongoing commitment to leave this planet a better place. engaging young people in activities that develop leadership skills, Most importantly, thanks to the 3,218 young adults and teens who promote an ethic of stewardship, and provide opportunities for served from one to twelve months last year in so many positions of hands-on service leadership and service throughout the nation. You are the reason SCA will remain true to its founding values and commitment to we all actively support SCA and share a common belief in the next conserve national parks and other public lands. Increasingly, generation of conservation leaders. however, you will see SCA volunteers preserving city parks, creating community green spaces, and leading local citizens in restoration efforts. Other SCA members will be working with neighborhood organizations to help residents reduce energy consumption and Dale M. Penny waste production. And larger numbers of SCA alumni will be taking President their places as professional leaders in land management agencies and nonprofit environmental groups. Annual Report 2007 5 Conserving communities, advancing diversity The SCA journey that began on remote hiking trails in Washington and Wyoming in 1957 is now blazing a new trail through cities, neighborhoods and classrooms from coast to coast. “SCA enables young people to do something bold,” says Milwaukee County Parks Director Sue Black. In a 2007 op-ed piece, Black wrote “many of these teens have never set foot in a park or ever experienced the wonders of nature. Yet by working for [SCA] they not only get career guidance but an education in bugs, dirt and sweat.” With the aid of many civic-minded partners, SCA substantially expanded its community conservation programs last year to address at-risk environments in more than a dozen major cities. “Group to Make City Greener and Cleaner” hailed The Baltimore Examiner as SCA volunteers revived local parks with the support of Johnson Controls. The NFL’s Jacksonville Jaguars sponsored SCA teens in Florida’s largest city, and Mayor Dannel Malloy and General Electric led a broad coalition backing SCA’s Stamford, CT debut. “We did make a change here!” exclaimed 16-year old volunteer Frank Wright. And new SCA initiatives are planned in Boston and Detroit in 2008. 6 Student Conservation Association Bringing conservation home In collaboration with Forest Preserves of Cook County, SCA sent a team of Chicago students to rid a dazzlingly rich prairie of invasive cottonwood. Discovering such a vastly different landscape just a few miles from their urban neighborhoods opened the interns’ eyes as well as their minds. “It’s all connected,” said Michelle Arellano, “from the ocean to the prairies. This land is part of our history and it’s important to preserve it.” In West Virginia, SCA members taught local homeowners, businesses and governments to cut energy and water usage and reduce waste – one courthouse alone slashed its annual electric bill by nearly $30,000. Other volunteers provided environmental education to thousands of impressionable youngsters from Massachusetts elementary schools to Idaho’s Nez Perce Michelle Arellano, SCA Intern reservations. And in 2008, through a grant from NBC Universal, SCA will plant additional seeds of stewardship by launching high school conservation clubs across the U.S. SCA volunteers are succeeding in getting city and suburban residents to see themselves as a part of our environment, not apart from it. They’re bringing conservation home.