The Student Conservation Association’s Conservation Program Teaches Leadership, 
Environmental Awareness

(WASHINGTON, D.C.—July 7, 2011) If you happened to have come across students sporting blue SCA shirts and yellow helmets in Montrose Park this summer, don’t be alarmed! These students are spending their summer working with the Student Conservation Association as part of a summer Conservation Crew. The program, which lasts six weeks, focuses on conservation issues and community development through hands-on experience, leadership training, and job building skills.

The crew of six students is part of 9 other crews that will be engaging in conservation work throughout the DC, VA, and MD area. The summer conservation crew runs from June 27 through August 5, and concludes with a graduation ceremony and celebration. One of the crews, the Rock Creek Park Crew, will focus on repairing a severely eroded trail in Montrose Park in Georgetown. Once completed, the trail will provide a safer alternative route to walk from Montrose Park to Dumbarton Oaks. The crew will be in Montrose Park from June 27th-July 8th.They will also work to finish an erosion control project that was started last summer in the Piney Branch part of the Rock Creek Park. The end result is what keeps crew member London Connor, a high school senior who was on the Piney Branch crew last year, returning to SCA. She says, “after all the hard work and sweat I like to see the end result.”

The crew is led by crew leader Devin Hyde who is a former Peace Corps volunteer and current graduate student at the University of Maryland Baltimore. Brenda Lopez, who has been a student leader in SCA for 6 years and has been on many local and national crews herself, will be a crew leader apprentice. According to Brenda “SCA allows urban youth to experience things they don’t normally experience.” That experience is what has taken Brenda all the way to Dinosaur National Monument in Colorado to Glacier National Park in Montana and right back in her own backyard in DC.

All of the students on the crew are SCA alumni and are no strangers to working in the hot and humid DC summer. According to Ray Fuller, a recent graduate of Anacostia High School, “I like to help the kids make this place a better environment and get more people involved in Earth Day events.”

The program also offers educational opportunities which students participate in every Friday. During these enriching Fridays, summer crews meet with each other for environmental education covering an array of topics such as sessions discussing conservation tools, environmental issues, and job building skills. Brenda Lopez said, “this past Friday we went on a boat in the Anacostia River with Living Classrooms where we dissected clams, identified fish, and even got to steer the boat!” These educational Fridays are important for the crews because it allows them to reflect and grow from their experiences.

This opportunity that SCA provides for young adults is extremely important especially when the unemployment rate among 16 to 24 year holds is 19.1 percent according to the Department of Labor. The work that SCA participants provide to public lands is critical to maintenance work that otherwise may not have been completed and is a
benefit to all who use the park.

Elizabeth Dangio of the Friends of Montrose Park says, “Friends of Montrose Park is grateful for SCA’s generous contribution this summer. Their hardworking team worked tirelessly despite the heat to complete a much needed footpath project. We rely on skilled organizations such SCA as well as the generosity of our neighbors to ensure that the Montrose Park is maintained and enhanced.”

About Student Conservation Association:
SCA is a nationwide conservation force of college and high school volunteers who protect and restore America’s parks, forests, and other public lands.  For more than 50 years, SCA’s active, hands-on approach to conservation has helped to develop a new generation of conservation leaders, inspire lifelong stewardship, and save our planet.  To learn more, visit www.thesca.org