About
the program service accomplishments shown below support the summary of the Society's accomplishments during the year ended August 31, 2020, which include: Program Service Accomplishments - EDUCATION AND SANCTUARIES New Jersey Audubons (NJA) education team creates and conducts programming that meets our mission of connecting all people with nature and stewarding the nature of today for all people of tomorrow. Staff worked across the state to inform, educate, and engage 426,214 people through a diversified platform of communications outreach and direct programming. While the COVID-19 pandemic impacted in person program participation with an almost complete shutdown of nature centers and programs for six months and with reduced limits for the additional six months we still engaged 106,214 people on our sanctuary trails, at our migration watches, and through in-person and virtual programming. We conducted 1,265 programs focused on ecology, birding, nature exploration, sustainability, land stewardship, gardening for wildlife and wildlife migration which directly reached 5,404 children and 25,656 adults. Of the total number of adults 1,117 were teachers who impacted an additional 26,808 students (24 students/teacher) in Science, Technology, Engineering and Math (STEM) practices. NJAs programs are designed with the organizations conservation priorities in mind. Programs range from connecting very young children with the wonders of nature to training teachers in environmental science and sustainability to sharing the magic of bird and butterfly migration to adults across the hemisphere. With constraints surrounding COVID-19, all programs needed to be rethought and redesigned including summer camps, school field trips, festivals, afterschool programs, adult natural history field trips and general nature programs for families. Programs that traditionally were conducted in person needed to be transformed to online, virtual platforms or to be done completely outdoors. New technologies needed to be learned and those programs that could be conducted in person were done with reduced program capacity and following strict health and safety protocols. Despite restrictions, NJA continued to innovate with a highly successful World Series of Birding (At Home Version), online spring and fall birding festivals, a hybrid monarch festival utilizing both a virtual and in person model, a Birders Bucket List Bash to engage people from around the world in eco-tourism and multiple series of learning webinars on bird families, gardening for wildlife, nature photography and de-stressing through nature-based yoga. Our fall migration watch which occurred September through December 2019 and pre-COVID continued to command high visitation numbers while the spring migration watches in Cape May and Montclair were conducted but were not open to the public due to the pandemic. NJA values our partners, collaborators, and sponsors. With funding from the PSEG Foundation through National Wildlife Federation (NWF), NJA staff worked alongside the NJ School Boards Association to identify and recognize nine school teams for innovative projects and prototypes designed to solve real world problems. All projects in this STEAM Tank competition had to include an environmental sustainability piece. NJA continues to oversee, with the NJ Department of Education, the national Green Ribbon Schools program. BASF continues to support NJAs efforts to connect middle school students and teachers to environmental science learning through implementation of the BASF Nature of Chemistry series. Spring field trips and classroom visits are an integral part of this program and with New Jersey schools shut down, no in person experiences were allowed. Instead, our staff worked directly with the teachers to support their efforts in doing science from home. As a result, students and teachers created projects that they could implement at home or follow up with recommendations for school changes based on their school problem solving. This years projects ranged from removing school rugs to make indoor air quality better to creating rain gardens to reduce stormwater runoff and erosion. All programs are delivered in such a way as to support the Eco-Schools USA program that NJA administers as part of our partnership with NWF. In person programs supporting urban communities were curtailed due to COVID-19, but virtual summer programs were conducted in Newark, Plainfield, and Wildwood. Additionally, NJA staff created summer nature quests for children to explore their own yards and neighborhoods. Through Ocean First Foundations Good Neighbor Fund, we were able to provide these quests to military families at no cost. Teacher workshops, summer institutes, webinars and face-to-face meetings are essential to train and support our teachers to integrate ecology, environmental science and sustainability into their curricula. With schools closed and struggling to provide equitable access to technology for remote learning as well as train their teachers to utilize new forms of technology, there was less engagement with teachers during this time period. Those teachers who did participate in remote learning or limited in person learning were grateful for the assistance and resources. The John B. Snow Memorial Trust and Verizon Foundation provided support for teacher professional development around watershed health around the Passaic River. Work with the NJ Natural Lands Trust, with a grant from the William Penn Foundation, enabled continued teacher professional development around the Delaware Watershed and Pettys Island. NJA has encouraged thousands of people to create habitat for birds, butterflies and other species through programs, native plant sales and incentive programs. Due to the pandemic, staff had to re-envision all programs related to the Garden for wildlife program. We planned and conduct the organizations first ever society wide native plant sale where people pre-ordered and picked plants up curbside. Garden certifications increased by 47% during 2020 from the previous year as people stayed home and improved their yards for wildlife. We also launched a pilot program Garden for Wildlife to engage more people in gardening and working with others to do the same. Over 41,645 people visited our nature centers and walked miles of trails enjoying all manner of nature exploration. NJA kept its trails open during the early days of the pandemic for people to enjoy, understanding that connecting with nature during this very difficult time was a high priority. Many local and state parks were closed during the early months of the pandemic. With buildings remaining closed, much needed habitat stewardship and restoration occurred using newly developed Field Work Health and Safety Protocols. Staff undertook the majority of this work including removing invasive plant species, creating native plant gardens (especially for pollinators) and conducting trail maintenance and enhancement as volunteers were only able to assist on a very limited basis. No large groups of volunteers were engaged during this time period. NJA operates seven migration watches during the year through its Cape May Bird Observatory (Cape May Hawkwatch, Avalon Seawatch, Songbird Morning Flight, Cape May Springwatch, Monarch Monitoring Program, Montclair Hawkwatch spring and fall). Funds to support these signature programs come from individual donors, Swarovski Optik, Zeiss, Actions@EBMF and others. These sites provided over 32,392 people with access to wildlife migration phenomena (hawk migration, seabird migration, songbird migration, butterfly migration) and information about the species through direct interpretive programming. Data from these watches helps monitor species population trends and inform conservation actions. During 2020, New Jersey Audubon had 828 volunteers who contributed 7,160 total hours to the organization. This is about 50% of the total number of volunteers that the organization typically engages in a non COVID In addition to the stewardship work, these volunteers conducted programs, led field trips, participated in bird and butterfly monitoring, helped in our nature stores and provided assistance with all manner of administrative tasks.
In care of MARK Carmichael
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