The educational goals of both of TreePeople's Rooted y Refrescado Programs (Huntington Park as well as San Fernando) supported by the Outdoor Equity Grants Program have the same foundation: sharing the benefits of exposure to nature paralleled by an introduction to environmental stewardship led by TreePeople educators from these same communities who also demonstrate green career pathways in their own lives. All Rooted y Refrescado Programs are backed by solid STEAM standards, California's Environmental Concepts and Principles, and LAUSD's Climate Literacy Initiative pedagogy.

Unique to Huntington Park, we are focusing on the urban characteristics of nature in Salt Lake Park, where a myriad of park uses can be appreciated by community members - from sports to family picnics to exercise opportunities or a gathering of friends - and the ways nature helps to mitigate pollutants from nearby freeways, factories, and facilities. Living in an area with a CalEnviron Score within the 87th percentile, Huntington Park youth are deeply invested in learning about nature's salutary impact and green careers in natural resource management.

Educational Goals Achieved Through Activities in the Community: Through both the Eco-Tours and Community Planting activities in the community, TreePeople is able to promote service-learning opportunities between school and local communities in addition to showing career pathways in the local context. These events engaged schools and families within Huntington Park, at locations close to the schools and/or Salt Lake Park.

Eco-Tours - 1 activity/trip completed Objective: Instruction in STEAM principles that connect students to nature TreePeople provides Eco-Tours of Salt Lake Park to students of Huntington Park to connect them to nature experiences that also demonstrate STEAM topics within their communities, where TreePeople models environmental stewardship prior to the students’ participation in Community Plantings.

Community Plantings - 1 activity/trip completed Objective: Foster stewardship of the environment through hands-on tree plantings, maintenance and care; Promote service-learning opportunities between schools and local communities Youth and families participate in Community Tree Plantings or Native Plant Restoration Events that teach skills that directly improve the local urban environment and help community members understand the role of natural resources management in securing environmental justice. These events help participants to foster environmental stewardship through education about and physical connection to nature.

Community outreach efforts for the activities in the community included TreePeople attending two events: Community Environmental Health Workshop at Walnut Park Elementary School in addition to a working lunch hosted by Alliance for a Better Community that allowed for networking and relationship building with other community partners that have overlapping work. TreePeople goes directly into schools to reach out to teachers, principals, and other administrators both in-person and via email.

Educational Goals Achieved Through Nature Area Trips: Aire Libre Trips - 3 activities/trips completed Objective: Rooted in STEAM principles and Environmental Principles and Concepts; connecting participants specifically to nature. Aire Libre Trips take participants on tours of TreePeople’s Coldwater Canyon Park to learn more about the environment and ecosystems and to promote healthy lifestyles. Aire Libre Trips are geared towards Huntington Park community members of all ages, as demonstrated by the event affiliated with Mujeres de la Tierra attended by families and community members of all ages.

OEP

Nature Walks - 3 activities/trips completed Objectives: Rooted in STEAM & NGSS Principles and connect the youth to nature. Nature Walks–although similar to Aire Libre Trips, these trips are geared solely to school-aged youth. These trips are rooted in the Next Generation Science Standards’ Disciplinary Core Idea (DCI) Human Impacts on Earth Systems and LAUSD’s Climate Literacy Taskforce Recommendations. By immersing students in the real-world environments that they are studying, these field trips provide tangible experiences that connect theory to practice. Through experiential learning in outdoor settings, students are better equipped to make informed choices and contribute to the responsible stewardship of our planet. While the intergenerational Aire Libre Trips are important for weaving the benefits of nature and place-based engagement in families and communities, the opportunity for students to explore nature with the peers and teachers alongside Eco Educators who have come from the same neighborhoods provides for a “near-peer” mentoring by staff who come from the Huntington Park.

TreePeople's Rooted y Refrescado, supported by the Outdoor Equity Program, shares a unified mission: expose youth to nature and environmental stewardship, demonstrating green career pathways. Aligned with STEAM standards, California's Environmental Concepts and Principles, and LAUSD's Climate Literacy Initiative pedagogy, the program highlights the urban ecosystem in Huntington Park. Locally, TreePeople completed 8 Eco-Tours centered on building environmental stewardship leaders and exposure to green career pathways; and 10 Community Tree Plantings (deliverable met) that cultivate ownership and commitment within the community. 7 Aire Libre Trips, 1 Restoration Trip, and 34 Nature Walks immerse participants in nature and stewardship aligned with Next Generation Science Standards. Through Service Learning and Environmental activities, TreePeople fosters green career exploration and reduces eco-anxiety while building connection to local ecosystems.

Mujeres de la Tierra

Both TreePeople and Mujeres de la Tierra serve the Southeast Los Angeles region, focusing on culturally relevant and place-based programming to families, and have a history of collaboration. Mujeres de la Tierra took part in an Aire Libre Trip with TreePeople in September, strengthening the relationship between the two agencies. Mujeres de la Tierra also worked with TreePeople to gather participant registrations for the event. TreePeople benefits through community partnerships such as Mujeres de la Tierra, whose strong engagements with families built on trust and cultural relevance helps TreePeople to find ready acceptance with families to complement and build beyond our traditional focus on relationships with schools.

City of Huntington Park

The City of Huntington Park has had a relationship with TreePeople for multiple years. The City determines what dates TreePeople will host tree planting events in addition to ensuring all trees being planted are free of hazards and appropriate for the selected locations. Using the days and sites the City has determined, TreePeople can host tree planting events to fulfill deliverables. TreePeople led a tree planting event in Huntington Park in November to fulfill Rooted y Refrescado deliverables with the City’s support. TreePeople is evolving our outreach with schools in 2024 to better engage students in community tree planting events. This fall, we realized the City’s tree planting events often occur on weekends, which makes it difficult to connect a school to the planting event. Other challenges are holidays and days when the schools cannot participate. As a result, the Rooted y Refrescado project often has a lower turnout than expected this fall, but we have adjusted with a clear plan for 2024. Similarly, tree planting events on the urban streets are not as well suited for schools as originally imagined. In 2024, TreePeople is working more closely with the City to identify the best dates to target towards schools and also families.

Alliance for a Better Community

Alliance for a Better Community (ABC) is a new but promising partner with TreePeople on planting events in Huntington Park. As a Latino-focused community powerbase focused on K-12 education, civic engagement, plus economic and environmental justice, ABC will help connect parents who want to bring youth and families outdoors with the TreePeople’s Rooted y Refrescado project in 2024. Establishing this partnership in addition to developing a plan on how the relationship will look into 2024. Alliance for a Better Community also hosted a working lunch with several community partners that had overlapping work to talk about best practices and how to collaborate across disciplines and regions. With this new partnership, TreePeople has specific plans with Alliance for a Better Community to engage families in local plantings during the key spring planting season of 2024. Similar to our productive collaboration with Mujeres de la Tierra, TreePeople benefits by allying with Huntington Park’s trusted and deep-rooted community organizations as a way to engage families.

LAUSD: Climate Literacy Champions

TreePeople has been working closely with LAUSD’s Climate Literacy Champion Program, which builds capacity for climate literacy instruction led by LAUSD educators. TreePeople will be collaborating in two key events in spring semester 2024 to teach these 300 Climate Champion teachers about TreePeople’s Rooted y Refrescado and additional programs. In January 2024, TreePeople will present to roughly 300 Climate Champion Educators to share about TreePeople’s programming geared towards youth and students. In March, 2024, TreePeople hosts a half-day training for the Climate Champion Educators at our headquarters park.

TreePeople has scheduled Vernon City Elementary on a tour later in December, which is a Climate Champion School, the scheduling of this tour led to a relationship being established with the City of Vernon Public Works.

Pacific Boulevard Elementary, another Climate Champion School, was the first school TreePeople took on an activity in the community. The school has now planned to come on a Natural Area Trip to TreePeople in December 2023.

TreePeople is currently in conversations with various other Climate Champion Schools regarding the upcoming 2024 academic year.

LAUSD’s Climate Champion Educators have a contractual obligation to champion and scale climate literacy education throughout their school. TreePeople has created streamlined opportunities to schedule spring engagements with Climate Champion teachers from Huntington Park who will attend these two TreePeople-specific trainings about our programs. LAUSD: Linked Learning TreePeople’s Director of Education and Outdoor Equity has previous relationships with LAUSD’s Linked Learning Program that have been opportune in supporting TreePeople’s Rooted y Refrescado Program. LAUSD’s Career Technical Education and Linked Learning Department ensures that every student has the opportunity to access a high-quality, industry-relevant career pathway, creating a perfect relationship with TreePeople to be able to offer those career-specific opportunities to students.

TreePeople has begun to establish partnerships with two Linked Learning Schools: Chester W. Nimitz Elementary and Henry T. Gage Middle School (both in Huntington Park) with plans to work with them in 2024. These meetings have helped TreePeople to learn more about and spark discussions on workforce development with the students regarding careers such as urban forestry and resource management.

TreePeople has begun relationships with Linked Learning to establish internships through their career development pathways in the near future with students. Due to unforeseen circumstances with the bus company, TreePeople had to reschedule two separate trips with Henry T. Gage Middle. Because of this, TreePeople adapted and went to the school to provide an alternative to the students, helping to strengthen the relationship with the school's teachers and administrators.

City of Vernon Public Works

TreePeople developed a relationship with the Principal of Vernon City Elementary in partnership with the City of Vernon Public Works to provide environmental educational experiences for schools. The City of Vernon has only 7 schools, and the Department of Public Works was interested in seeing what TreePeople could offer to their schools. TreePeople has already been in contact with 1 of schools with a trip planned for December Vernon City Elementary t has scheduled a trip in December with two distinct grade levels, each requiring a different type of programming. Working with smaller schools has expanded TreePeople’s ability to be flexible and responsive in the programming we offer to best answer the needs of the schools.

(1) MiSELA , an LGBTQ+ youth center, has partnered with TreePeople’s Outdoor Equity Program to provide outdoor experiences like Aire Libre trips, promoting mental well-being through nature. In addition, MiSELA, engages members in TreePeople’s Community Tree Plantings, offering community hours to youth toward graduation and supporting community environmental goals. (2) The Conservation Corps actively participates in TreePeople’s Community Tree Plantings and Aire Libre trips, helping involve local youth. This partnership has helped maintain strong participation numbers in TreePeople’s Outdoor Equity Program, supporting our Community Tree Planting deliverables. (3) San Antonio Elementary School has become a valued partner, frequently bringing students to TreePeople’s offering at Salt Lake Park, supporting our mission to bring outdoor experiences to youth. Students have expressed strong enjoyment and enthusiasm for the field trips.

TreePeople has learned various lessons throughout Year 1 of the Rooted y Refrescado Program. Schools throughout the state have noted an increasing amount of absenteeism, which has affected this project’s ability to meet the goal number of students predicted at events; this has also affected our ability to plan and purchase the appropriate amount of food. For example, if a teacher has 35 seats available in their classroom, they will typically schedule a tour anticipating all students will be present. On the day of the tour, sometimes as few as 20 of that original 35 will be present. TreePeople is usually not notified of this unforeseen attrition ahead of the tour, resulting in a surplus of food and last-minute planning changes to accommodate to a smaller group. TreePeople will use data from Year 1 of the grant to better anticipate attrition rates as well as make changes to the field trip registration process to capture declines in attendance as soon as teachers foresee them.

Another unforeseen challenge that TreePeople encountered was discovering that second through fifth grade classrooms tend to be less than 30 students, which has been an additional hurdle when fulfilling grant deliverables. TreePeople will be working in 2024 with the schools and educators to attempt taking more than one classroom to fulfill the deliverable. High school teachers also strive to involve all of their classes when scheduling trips, which can pose scheduling challenges in high schools with students in multiple classes with different teachers. As a result, TreePeople has learned to strategize and create a calendar of specific days for offering trips to high schools versus elementary schools. This strategic approach not only addresses logistical constraints but also facilitates the planning of our field trip calendar for the school year.

The final lesson learned was regarding the planning of the events. TreePeople has learned that Saturdays and school breaks are difficult times to engage participants in the activities. Consequently, TreePeople has adapted by working with the community to offer the events on days that they know participation is more likely. Those days include Monday through Friday and exclude early dismissal days, exam days, or holidays.

TreePeople has gained insights to enhance family and community engagement despite scheduling conflicts in Year 2. To address this, we’re implementing flexible scheduling, collaborating with school networks, and partnering with local shops to increase participation in Aire Libre Trips. We’ve also adapted to challenges like late bus arrivals, ensuring communication with bus companies and schools are held before, during, and after trips to help teachers navigate delays. For restoration activities, we’ve shifted to nearby locations like El Monte and Debs Park to ensure greater accessibility. Additionally, interest in the internship program has emphasized the importance of follow-up and targeted outreach, using GIS to identify target schools, enhancing connections with students, and maximizing program impact across the community, strengthening overall program effectiveness.