My Nonprofit Reviews

California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW) owns and manages lands which are conserved and protected for the benefit of sensitive wildlife species and their habitats. I am the Reserve Manager for some of the CDFW properties in San Diego County. One of the properties I am responsible for is the Rancho Jamul Ecological Reserve (RJER). I have not always been a wildlands biologist. The road that brought me to this place was anything but straight.

I grew up in suburban southern California, in an area I now fondly think of as the Human Storage Facility (HSF). The HSF is encapsulated by the retaining walls that separate our suburbs from our freeways. Like me, children who grow up in the HSF reach adulthood still bearing the vague notion that food originates from grocery stores, water comes from the tap, and natural wonders are just places some of us got to visit during family summer vacations. The first time Earth Discovery Institute (EDI) hosted one of their K-12 environmental education field trips at RJER, I discovered what really defines the HSF. It is the experience of a childhood spent disconnected from the natural world. A void in human development, rather than a physical location or circumstance.

The morning of the EDI field trip began with sea of fourth graders spilling from the busses onto the RJER parking lot. My son happened to be one of them. Despite their excitement, EDI staff deftly gathered the students and organized them into small manageable groups. Each group was led by an enthusiastic instructor, who moved their students from station to station. At each station, the kids participated in hands-on activities related to natural processes, species, and habitats. They explored the importance of pollinators, planted native plants, and practiced biological discovery using species identification keys, binoculars, and magnifying lenses. By the time the kids loaded back into the busses, they were happily chatting about watershed processes, and coming up with ideas to enhance their own backyard habitats to help struggling populations of native butterflies and bees. In just a few hours, with the guidance of their qualified and caring EDI instructors, those kids began transcending the Human Storage Facility.

As adults, our choices and values determine who maintains residence in the HSF, and who does not. Local community members are provided opportunities to connect with the natural world through EDI’s outreach and community service programs. Our public lands provide the platform for healthy public connection, and the venues developed by EDI provide services which benefit the lands, and those of us tasked with managing them. My ‘neighbors’ are the residents who live near or adjacent the properties I manage. Many of them have infinitely more access to the lands than I have. It has been my experience that the more knowledgeable and invested my neighbors are, the more resistant our public lands are to damage from incompatible human activities.

Finally, the EDI volunteers. There is nobody I’d rather clean seeds with than the staff and volunteers at EDI. You know who you are. Week after week, you preserve my faith, and boost my spirits. Thank you for your persistent and dedicated efforts.