Sixty college students will spend their spring break greening a Grand Canyon parking lot, planting trees, and removing non-native plants on a program run by the Student Conservation Association (SCA).
All of the volunteers are members of the SCA, a national service organization dedicated to conservation efforts.
The students will come during their spring break to work to improve popular Mather Point on the Canyon’s South Rim in Arizona. In two weeks the students are expected to plant some 8,000 plants to re-green the area from the impact of car traffic.
Only days after the SCA posted the spring break trip to its Web site, the association was bombarded with more than 300 applications from its student members.
“Service, stewardship, and sustainability are very important to today’s students,“ stated SCA Vice President Kevin Hamilton in a press release. ”When you add to that an icon like the Grand Canyon, the desire to take action and make a stand runs off the chart.”
The program will take two teams of 30 students; the first team from March 14 to 20, the second from March 28 to April 3. This is the third consecutive year of SCA’s Alternative Spring Break program. A grant from American Eagle Outfitters funds the program.
“It is very exciting that SCA’s Alternative Spring Break is returning to the Grand Canyon,” said Deputy Superintendent Palma Wilson in the release. This will be the third spring break the program has gone to the area.
The students will work on the final phase of a multiyear project transforming a formerly blacktopped parking area by planting thousands of native trees and shrubs to return the parking lot to its natural state.
The students are planning to put 8,000 plants in the ground. Park officials say the job would take seasonal staff months to accomplish.
Students will salvage native plants in some areas and plant new ones as well. Students will also be removing non-native invasive species.
“The decisions we make today will carry over into the future, leaving either a legacy of conservation or devastation,” said Austin Barrett, a Parks, Recreation, and Tourism major from South Carolina.
Another student participating in the project, ecology major at the University of Arizona Bonnie Raschke, says that in addition to reducing her own ecological footprint, she wants to do more.
“Recycling, donating, and petitions aren’t enough,“ Bonnie says. ”I want to get my hands dirty.”
All of the volunteers are members of the SCA, a national service organization dedicated to conservation efforts.
The students will come during their spring break to work to improve popular Mather Point on the Canyon’s South Rim in Arizona. In two weeks the students are expected to plant some 8,000 plants to re-green the area from the impact of car traffic.
Only days after the SCA posted the spring break trip to its Web site, the association was bombarded with more than 300 applications from its student members.
“Service, stewardship, and sustainability are very important to today’s students,“ stated SCA Vice President Kevin Hamilton in a press release. ”When you add to that an icon like the Grand Canyon, the desire to take action and make a stand runs off the chart.”
The program will take two teams of 30 students; the first team from March 14 to 20, the second from March 28 to April 3. This is the third consecutive year of SCA’s Alternative Spring Break program. A grant from American Eagle Outfitters funds the program.
“It is very exciting that SCA’s Alternative Spring Break is returning to the Grand Canyon,” said Deputy Superintendent Palma Wilson in the release. This will be the third spring break the program has gone to the area.
The students will work on the final phase of a multiyear project transforming a formerly blacktopped parking area by planting thousands of native trees and shrubs to return the parking lot to its natural state.
The students are planning to put 8,000 plants in the ground. Park officials say the job would take seasonal staff months to accomplish.
Students will salvage native plants in some areas and plant new ones as well. Students will also be removing non-native invasive species.
“The decisions we make today will carry over into the future, leaving either a legacy of conservation or devastation,” said Austin Barrett, a Parks, Recreation, and Tourism major from South Carolina.
Another student participating in the project, ecology major at the University of Arizona Bonnie Raschke, says that in addition to reducing her own ecological footprint, she wants to do more.
“Recycling, donating, and petitions aren’t enough,“ Bonnie says. ”I want to get my hands dirty.”
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