Stories from the Field

Welcome to the third park featured in our Sense of Place series: Yosemite National Park, where NatureBridge began 50 years ago. As the birthplace of the national park idea, Yosemite National Park has inspired generations of people from around the world to become stewards of the natural world. With gushing waterfalls, towering mountain peaks, alpine lakes, and giant sequoia groves and massive glacially carved granite domes, Yosemite is one of the most beautiful and unique parks in the country - as well as an epic living classroom!

In his capacity as a coastal hazards specialist at University of Washington’s Washington Sea Grant, Ian Miller spends his time communicating the dangers of climate change to the people who are directly affected by them. A former NatureBridge educator and director of education at our Olympic campus, Ian understands that scientists get a bad rap when it comes to communicating to non-scientists. Read this entry in our 50 Stories series to see how he uses educational strategies he learned at NatureBridge to remove those barriers and translate science in a way that creates understanding and spurs action.

"There's a transformational piece that happens with almost every single person who receives the Baxter Award. You know, it’s not just people testing their physical limits and climbing incredible peaks or something. It’s also spiritual, emotional and psychological,” says Kristina Rylands. The award has become much like Matt Baxter himself: larger than life. The power of the individual transcendent experiences that happen each year as part of the Baxter Award have coalesced over 25 years to create an unbreakable spirit of community and adventure. It has become integral to NatureBridge and also represents the best, unique qualities of the organization.

Jerry Edelbrock is a builder: a builder of partnerships, a builder of people and a builder of visions. In 1983, long before the notion of a Yosemite Institute (YI) in Olympic National Park at the Rosemary Inn had come to fruition, Jerry was building the foundation for what was to come. Throughout his time building connections, infrastructure, and programming in Olympic, Jerry always went back to one question: “Is it in the best interest of the park?”

Welcome to the second park featured in our Sense of Place series: Prince William Forest Park. In 2012, NatureBridge opened its first east coast campus at Prince William Forest Park, the largest green space in the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area. Located just 35 miles from the city, this 16,000 acres of woodlands are where nature and history unite. Here, students explore a Piedmont forest ecosystem while challenging themselves physically, building meaningful relationships and discovering a caring relationship with the natural world.

This story is part of our series, Students to Stewards, focused on the incredible trajectories of former NatureBridge students. Specifically, the impact of their program experience on where they are today. Ethan Elkind’s trajectory from a NatureBridge student in the 1990s to a leader in climate change research today is not typical, but it is illustrative — a significant, transformative NatureBridge experience played a role in Ethan’s life that went beyond spurring appreciation of nature. Read our interview with Ethan where we talked about how NatureBridge informed his worldview, the biggest victories he sees in climate policy and why he’s thankful for one particularly infamous meteor.

Since March 2020, the Covid-19 pandemic has shut down the increasingly popular programs in Prince William Forest, where programs like NatureBridge are a rarity. The campus pivoted to distance learning and “school yard” programs with excellent results. Still, teachers and students have been clamoring for in-person programs to return as soon as it is safe to do so.

At the end of 1996, weeks of cold rain in California’s Sierra Nevada mountains gave way to warm, tropical rainfall. Unusual for that time of year, the warm, heavy rains melted the snowpacks, which began to run down the mountain into the valleys below, including Yosemite Valley. In early January 1997, with NatureBridge educators living at the park and students scheduled to arrive soon, National Park Service (NPS) officials did not close the park out of an abundance of caution; they closed Yosemite because one million gallons of water was pouring into the valley. Every five seconds.

“You know, there's the dream, and then there's reality,” says Kristina. “To take that dream and that concept, and then have to go and really fulfill it — that’s a whole other challenge. An amazing challenge that Matt would pump his fist about.”

To all who knew him, Matt Baxter was a passionate, kind, gentle, funny and ravenously adventurous person. The former NatureBridge educator, who died in a climbing accident in Yosemite in April 1996, inspired children and adults alike throughout his life. It is no surprise that he continues to inspire people after his death.