Youth in Conservation

In addition to Sustainability Camp, this summer Synergia is offering four spaces in a special collaborative program with our friends at Tuleyome. Synergia first worked with Tuleyome on the Cache Creek Wild and Scenic project in 2005 and at that time made the student-involved film, Cache Creek Wild and Scenic. We started work on a film project for the proposed Berryessa-Snow Mtn National Conservation Area about a year ago.

Tuleyome is a conservation organization. (www.tuleyome.org) Like many such organizations, they are concerned not just with the environment, but with the challenge of how to introduce youth to the areas they are working so hard to protect. Tuleyome is particularly committed to youth who are "underserved" and do not have access to wild places and wild nature. They have developed a highly successful youth rafting program for young people from area programs and agencies. Last year our Youth in Conservation/Youth in Filmmaking students helped Tuleyome staff and volunteers to guide 35 young people down Cache Creek.

This year, Tuleyome and Synergia have partnered on a grant from the Stewardship Council to expand their youth program by bringing in the element of leadership. There are eight spaces for Tuleyome youth, and four open spaces. We encourage you to apply for one of the open spaces if you are between the ages of 15 and 18. It will be a remarkable opportunity to learn outdoor leadership skills, adventure with other young people, and work with diverse youth. We´ll be backpacking in the proposed NCA, and rafting on Cache Creek, all while learning to lead youth who may never otherwise experience the outdoors. Youth leading youth to discover wilderness, and hence, to want to  preserve it. We´ll continue work on the film we are making of the proposed NCA, as well.

Applications and more setailed descwill be available at www.synergia.us by April 1. As we can only take four applicants, please apply early.

You may be eligible for a full or partial sponsorship. Ask for a sponsorship application.

When Rose returns from Synergia trips she has so much to say.  She is touched by the experience and has grown so much.  Her vocabulary has expanded and her thinking has grown to include concepts that she would not have met in her day-to-day life at home.  She is confident, yet open to listening. Rose can explain the ecosystems she has visited and the needs of those ecosystems.  The interviewing process has helped her to listen closely to other’s words, their passions and their vision of the future. 

                                                              - JoEllen Di Nicola, mother of Synergia student

I think a lot of importance in this kind of learning comes directly from experience. The way that this is different than regular learning is that we’re out here experiencing everything firsthand and that’s a lot of the way we get our information. We’re actively participating, we’re actively seeing it, we’re being out in Nature which is something that everyone needs to do a lot more of, and be educated on those kind of issues -- raising consciousness about the world, the state of the world. Being with Synergia helps you to learn some things that I think would actually be valuable in life.   – Rosalie, Synergia student   

The work that young people are doing is an important part of the fundamental social shift that we are going to have to make in the next few years if we want to adapt effectively to the changing natural conditions that come with global climate change.

–      Michael Warburton, Executive Director of the Public Trust Alliance and Synergia mentor