Educational goals achieved include connecting the community with nature in a way that promotes environmental stewardship. Through our partnership Colton community members participated in onsite efforts that directly impacted the Mojave Deserts Land Trusts goal to planting species noninvasive to the environment. This objective was met by working alongside Colton High School educators to align the program curriculum with the content standards for California public schools including, but not limited to, the Next Generation Science standards.

We are proud to see an increase in participation in outdoor activities in the Colton area, awareness of environmental needs, environmental literacy, and overall outdoor education. We have met our objectives through various activities, such as exploration of tide pools, both in class and in nature. We have incorporated pre and post surveys to assess knowledge gained. Final survey results will be available at the end of the program period. Throughout programming we have maintained original goals to expose students to activities on plant management, wildlife preservation, and techniques to advance environmental stewardship.

We worked with Colton High School at the homebase to approve dates for different activities, and natural area trips that are coming up in 2024. This is where in-depth preparation occurred for the natural area trips to prepare students and adults. We successfully engaged Colton in our first natural area trip partnered with Mojave Desert Land Trust in Desert Discovery Field Studies our in the Mojave Desert. It was an exciting opportunity to learn about the desert and the amount of effort it takes to grow and save important plants that create lasting effects on our environment. This gave students hands-on experience with gardens, and land exploration. A small hike through the desert was included in our tour, as well as a look into the private gardens that can harvest up to 50,000 plants in a year. Looking further into our future we will be including a survey for the students to fill out at the end of their experiences to review what they have gained from their time in an activity.

We have maintained our initial planned partnerships which has allowed us to develop a more secure relationship with partners that we can work with well after the length of the grant.

A lesson learned in with collaborating with various partners original program dates do not always work for everyone resulting in actual program dates occurring further out than anticipated. Although we were able to keep a couple dates on the books moving into 2024 ended working best for a majority of our collaborators. This slows the process down more than anticipated and would suggest planning dates further out to keep them realistic or minimizing how many individuals from the different parties need to be present so there is less schedule conflicts.

We have continued to learn that adaptability is key, especially when working with different educators within the district. With the school having some red tape we have had to be patient when timing our trips and open to changing plans when needed. We learned our first year that educators often go dark near the end of the school year rather than summer so this year we had already prepared for the slow summer period and had a meeting prepared with our partners at the start of the school year so we could get started immediately in the fall.