Thorne Ecological Institute

Programs: Summer camp - thorne summer camp in boulder, longmont, louisville, and littleton reaches more than 2,800 youth each summer through field-based "camp experiences" for kids ages 3-15. Learning takes place through hands- on, science-based, experiential activities in grasslands, evergreen forests, and wetland habitats as a classroom. Field trip program - the program engages more than 2,600 bvsd and svvsd second graders and nearly 500 students from other schools annually in a day-long field trip to the 45-acre sombrero marsh environmental education center in boulder or sandstone ranch in longmont. Through fun, hands-on, place-based environmental education experiences, students interact with, and learn to care about, the ecosystems around them. School programs - thorne's three-visit in-school program reaches nearly 6,000 elementary students each year. The program expands students' knowledge in the areas of science and literacy through a series of lessons that involve interactive explorations, inquiry-based experiments, scientific instruments and specimens, and writing a picture book. At select schools, thorne offers an additional twelve weeks of after school programming to 280 students who are interested in further expanding their knowledge of science and connection to nature. Nature for all - thorne provides in excess of 400,000 in camp scholarships and subsidized school programs to more than 7,000 youth from low-income and latino families each year (greater than 50% of thorne's total participants). Thorne believes that more frequent and in-depth interaction with participants increases the likelihood that they will truly connect with nature and become life-long stewards of the earth. For this reason, thorne has developed its nature immersion program (nip), which seamlessly delivers thorne's summer camp, field trip, in-school, and after school programs at elementary schools with high percentages of underserved youth.