Winner Of The Jack Johnson Registration Promotion!

We are excited to announce that Steven Cordova is the big winner of the Jack Johnson Registration Promotion! Steven and a lucky guest will receive two tickets to the SOLD OUT Jack Johnson show at Red Rocks on Sunday, August 17th, 2008. Steven is a Denver Zoo Teen Volunteer and he is registered for our Endangered Wolves and Animal Tracking Course with the Denver Zoo in July. Congrats Steven!

Free Change the World Movie Night: The 11th Hour

Join the Cottonwood Institute at the Fluid Coffee Bar in Denver this Thursday, June 12, 2008 at 6:30pm as we host a free screening of Leonardo DiCaprio’s The 11th Hour. After we watch the movie, we will host a discussion regarding things we can do to reduce our
environmental footprint. We will also learn about the Cottonwood Institute and the Fluid Coffee Bar’s environmental commitment and learn about opportunities to take action.  

The 11th Hour is the last moment when change is possible. The film explores how we’ve arrived at this moment — how we live, how we impact the earth’s ecosystems, and what we can do to change our course. Featuring ongoing dialogues of experts from all over the world, we will hear from over 50 leading scientists, thinkers and leaders who discuss the most important issues that face our planet and people.  

 

Help the Cottonwood Institute Win a $2,500 Matching Gift from Jack Johnson!

In March, we announced that Jack Johnson had committed to supporting the Cottonwood Institute this year through All At Once and the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation. Below are three exciting ways you can help us win a $2,500 matching gift from Jack Johnson to support our Griffith Scholarship Fund, win tickets to his sold out show at Red Rocks this summer, and learn how to volunteer at the Jack Johnson concert:

1. Register for a Course: If you register for a 2008 Cottonwood Institute course before Monday, June 9, 2008, you will be entered into a drawing to receive two tickets to Jack Johnson’s sold out Red Rocks show on Sunday, August 17th, 2008.
2. Donate $25 to our Griffith Scholarship Fund: When you make a $25 donation or more to our Griffith Scholarship Fund by Sunday, August 10th, 2008, not only will your donation be matched by Jack Johnson (up to $2,500), but you will be entered into a drawing to receive two tickets to the sold out Red Rocks show on Sunday, August 17th, 2008. Please consider making your donation through the Cottonwood Institute Facebook Cause. If you don’t have a Facebook account, but you would still like to help us reach our goal, please Click Here to make your donation online and enter "All At Once" in the designation section. We also accept checks made payable to: Cottonwood Institute, PO Box 7067, Denver, CO 80207.
3. Volunteer at the Jack Johnson Concert: Folks that register for a course before June 9, 2008 and/or make a $25 donation or more to the Griffith Scholarship Fund by Sunday, August 10, 2008 are eligible to register on a first come, first serve basis to volunteer at the sold out Jack Johnson Concert on Sunday, August 17th, 2008. Volunteers are needed to to help us with setting up and breaking down the “Village Green” as well as passing out the passports, interacting with the fans, and helping with other general tasks to make the “Village Green” run smoothly.

After you have actively participated in steps 1 and/or 2 listed above, please contact Ford Church via Email or call him directly at 303.447.1076 to register to volunteer at the Jack Johnson concert.

 

Radiating From Her Heart – Honoring A Veteran Of Service: Larry French

“I think it is important to foster an appreciation of nature, no matter how large, or small.” – Molly French

Have you ever taken the initiative to help a stranger? We hope this story inspires you to help those in need, as it has inspired us to tell this story of kindness.

This year, the Cottonwood Institute had an outreach booth at the Green Apple Music Festival in Denver’s City Park. While talking about our exciting Summer Courses for adventurous youth and adults, we met an amazing person, Molly French.

Molly listened as she walked by our booth about the Cottonwood Institute’s need to have proper equipment/gear for our high school aged youth to have during our Community Adventure Program overnights and Summer Course projects. A few weeks later, we received contact from her stating that she wanted to organize a gear drive with her friends (with the help of Kathy Albert and Tracey Roberts), and that she wanted to make a donation to our Griffith Scholarship Fund with her good friend Ilene Bloom in honor of her father’s life. Below are a few words about her father, Larry French:

“My Dad had a keen and subtle appreciation for nature. He spent a large part of his childhood on a lake in Indiana with his family. He took my brothers, sisters and myself camping almost every vacation as children. He wrote a letter to my mother every day he was in Vietnam (he was there for two years), many of the letters describing the beauty of that country in great detail. For as long as I can remember as a child, and into my adulthood, he did volunteer work for the Civitan Club out of Birmingham, Alabama. Part of that volunteer work was helping them prepare a summer camp for kids with disabilities. The few times he was able to visit me in Colorado, I took he and my mom to Steamboat, Durango, and Glenwood Springs. He loved the beauty of this state, and I am so glad he got to see parts of it.

My Dad unexpectedly and sadly died March of 2006. I cherish the times when I had a rare moment alone with my father (I have four siblings). During some of those moments, nature distracted and consumed his attention. For example, one time at the kids camp he came across a grove of birch trees. He took several pictures of the birches while he was lying on his back at the base of the grove. I can remember the first time I saw the photos of the birch trees and learned about his awe of nature. Another time we were walking on the beach, he saw a crab and followed it around for 20 minutes or so. I followed him; he followed the crab – in silence. I knew why he was distracted. He understood the power of nature, even in the smallest things. It’s important that young people have an opportunity to connect with nature on any level, then hopefully take that connection into adulthood as a catapult to involvement in environmental preservation – for example, from being part of a hands-on crew in restoring trails to taking on leadership positions in environmental organizations.”
- Molly French, May 30, 2008

On behalf of the Cottonwood Institute we would like to thank Molly, Ilene, Kathy and Tracey for taking the initiative to support our students. To learn how you can support the Cottonwood Institute please consider making a Donation, supporting our Griffith Scholarship Fund to help make our courses accessible to students in need, donating an item on our Wish List, or joining us in the field for one of our amazing Summer Courses.

Eating Ecologically

The Community Adventure Program (CAP) is a class offered at New Vista
High School through the Cottonwood Institute that combines outdoor
education with environmental stewardship. A large aspect of the class
is spent creating a student-directed Action Project concerning a local
environmental issue. The students must design a project that will
educate people about the issue and create a positive impact in the
community. This quarter, our CAP class chose to focus on the
environmental effects of the food industry and we titled our project
‘Eating Ecologically’. Our goal was to educate the students at our high
school about how to eat ecologically by buying local and organic food
to reduce their environmental footprint. We also wanted to collect data
from local restaurants in order to educate the public about which
businesses are doing the most to be ‘green’.

We chose this project as a class because we feel that it is
important that people know about the food that they are eating, where
it comes from, and what goes into it. We soon found that there are
other organizations that have the same concerns we do. Michael Brownlee
from Boulder County Going Local came in to speak to our class about his
organization. Further research into our topic revealed that a similar
action is being taken at the University of Colorado where student Lilia
Justman has created a group called CU Going Local. She too came in to
speak with us about the importance of buying local. Speaking to both
Michael and Lilia really helped motivated us to get out into the
community and start educating!

We began researching different aspects of what goes into making a
‘green’ business and an eco-friendly restaurant. We then created five
categories that made a ‘green’ menu, inlcuding: local food, organic
food, meat and seafood, waste practices, and energy consumption. We
gathered resources on why these topics are important for businesses and
for the environment. We then took the data and organized it into an
informational pamphlet for the public.

Every year at New Vista High School there is a week called Four Days
in May that is dedicated to spending time helping the community. For
our CAP class this week served as a great way for us to focus on our
action project. We planned each day to help us execute our project as
effectively as possible. We wanted to learn what others were doing in
order to reduce their environmental footprint before taking what we had
learned to educate the community.

We
began the week by going to local restaurants to ask them questions
about their ecological practices. We asked how they reduce their waste
and energy consumption as well as what percentage of their products are
local and organic. We found that many restaurants are doing a lot to
move towards being green. Some are completely wind powered and buy all
of their produce locally when it is in season, while others use energy
efficient light bulbs and serve organic meat and produce. A lot of the
businesses that we visited did a fantastic job recycling and composting
as well. As a result of these interviews, we gained a new respect for
many of the businesses in Boulder that are working hard to be conscious
of their environmental impact. We also gained a new understanding of
how simple actions can have an immense impact on our environment. After
we collected all of our information, we compiled the data and created a
rating system for local restaurants in Boulder.

In order to increase the success of our action project and educate
ourselves about local opportunities to grow organically, we spent three
of the Four Days in May volunteering at local farms. This experience
gave us all a unique perspective about what goes into our food. Our
work with Growing Gardens provided a wonderful opportunity to explore
our community gardens and participate in growing local. We spent two
days with Abbondanza Organic Seeds and Produce learning about the
importance of creating balanced soil and open pollinated seed
cultivation. The first day we spent planting over half an acre of
potatoes, and the second day we spent transporting perennials. This
experience helped us realize how much time and effort it actually takes
to plant, grow, and process the food that we eat. A huge portion of the
local infrastructure is reliant on agriculture. This is easy to forget
and we seem to have forgotten our roots.

As a result of this project all of us have gained a new
understanding of how we can help to reduce our environmental footprint
through something a simple as consciously choosing what we eat. Many of
us were not previously aware of the economic benefits of buying local
and organic. Not only does it benefit our planet, but being aware of
what we are eating can also help us develop a sense of community around
our food. Too often we don’t think about what we eat or where it comes
from, most of the food that we eat travels over 1,500 miles to get to
us. Our class became aware of the need to educate as many people as
possible about the destruction that we are causing our planet because
of this ignorance. We each walked away with a new understanding of what
it means to eat healthily and ‘be green’.

For more information about the Cottonwood Institute and the
Community Adventure Program, please visit: www.CottonwoodInstitute.org

The Omnivore’s Dilemma

What should we have for dinner? It may seem like an innocent question, but in today’s America, that single question can be answered in a multitude of ways. Should it be fast food? Organic? Local? Natural? If you have ever found yourself engaged in a personal battle about what and how to eat, I suggest you check out The Omnivore’s Dilemma by Michael Pollan. In his book, Pollan does a fantastic job of researching and supplying (in sometimes grisly detail) the facts about the makeup of our food industry. From an Iowa corn farm to the completely self-sustained organic Polyface farm in Virgina, Pollan describes it all. He also brings to light several important issues about the environmental, health, and cultural effects of choosing one diet over another. Facts such as: one steer requires 35 gallons of oil to raise or 3 in every 5 Americans are considered ‘fat’ forces one to at least begin to think about the implications of what he or she eats. As Pollan states, “Imagine for a moment if we once again knew, strictly as a matter of course, these few unremarkable things: What it is we’re eating. Where it came from. How it found its way to our table. And what, in a true accounting, it really cost.”

Guiding Question: How much thought an intention do you put into what you eat, where it comes from, and its environmental impact?