SOL Scholarship & Gear Fund
Donation protected
NOW more than ever is the time to get children outdoors for frequent immune-boosting hits of Vitamin 'N"(Nature)! Our experience has shown us that when young children enroll in a forest school program, their families often spend more time outside, too, which means they are also boosting their immunity. In the pandemic world we are living in, this benefits us all because the more people who are healthy, the less likely we will get sick & the less taxing it is on the health system.
Since we will need to operate under reduced teacher-student ratios due to Covid, we are projected to lose 1/4 of our tuition earnings. In the past, we used some of our tuition earnings to support tuition scholarships to children/families in need.
Even with the challenge of Covid, we still hope to expand our programming to be more inclusive & equitable in the coming school year. Sadly, nature is still inaccessible to many. This may be due to lack of transportation, lack of accessibility for thoseTreeschoolers with Special Needs who may require additional support in the outdoors, lack of systemic-welcome to BIPOC children/families &/or lack of finances to cover the often expensive tuition costs of these unique programs. We envision our forest learning circle to include children who would, without a generous scholarship, be unable to attend. We also hope to be able to eventually offer once-monthly “Friendly Forest” sessions to children with Special Needs (SOL’s Founder/Director, a former Special Educator, started the first forest school program in the world for children who are deaf), perhaps in partnership with Nature Ninos, NM. This fundraising effort will go towards helping us to meet this goal of being a more welcoming program.
We humbly request your giving, both financially & energetically, in supporting SOL to get more children out into the forest! It costs $800 a year to send a Treeschooler to SOL one day a week, which works out to be $66 dollars a month. If you would like to sponsor a Treeschooler to attend SOL Forest School for a year, we promise that gift will have an enormous, positive impact on that child's life!
It also costs a lot to dress a child to be outside in all weather & this alone creates a barrier for most children in New Mexico. Please also consider sharing your own gently-used children's outdoor clothing & gear, &/or donate here to help us grow our gear library.
Full disclosure: SOL Forest School is a privately-owned LLC. The primary reason we are is because this way of being with preschool aged children- in the outdoors, all year-round, in all-weather- is still very, very new to the United States. There are rarely public funds or public programs available & hosting this kind of program is not cheap due to the insurance costs & the specialized training involved (truthfully, we barely earn enough to support teacher development & our Educators are lucky to make minimum wage, once we factor in the additional time & energy we put into the program beyond our hours in the forest spent with our Treeschoolers, yet our tuition remains too high for many to pay). Forbes magazine, Vogue magazine & National Public Radio all recently mentioned that Forest Schooling is a growing trend & that the Forest School pedagogy nourishes a child's body, mind & heart. We at Sol Forest School do "body, mind & heart" beautifully! This is our magic! This program IS our offering to our broken world. If you are passionate about social justice, earth stewardship (we grow future stewards of the earth!), young children & education, we hope you will consider donating generously to this fund.
THANK YOU for taking the time to read this, for sharing it amongst your friends & for donating, if you are able.
United-in-Nature,
SOL Forest School
www.solforestschool.com
https://www.facebook.com/soulfuloutdoorlearning/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kerrymcdonald/2020/05/11/four-k-12-education-models-that-may-gain-popularity-during-covid-19/#60027d2c6b77
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/17/878205853/5-radical-schooling-ideas-for-an-uncertain-fall-and-beyond
https://www.vogue.com/article/forrest-school-covid-summer
Since we will need to operate under reduced teacher-student ratios due to Covid, we are projected to lose 1/4 of our tuition earnings. In the past, we used some of our tuition earnings to support tuition scholarships to children/families in need.
Even with the challenge of Covid, we still hope to expand our programming to be more inclusive & equitable in the coming school year. Sadly, nature is still inaccessible to many. This may be due to lack of transportation, lack of accessibility for thoseTreeschoolers with Special Needs who may require additional support in the outdoors, lack of systemic-welcome to BIPOC children/families &/or lack of finances to cover the often expensive tuition costs of these unique programs. We envision our forest learning circle to include children who would, without a generous scholarship, be unable to attend. We also hope to be able to eventually offer once-monthly “Friendly Forest” sessions to children with Special Needs (SOL’s Founder/Director, a former Special Educator, started the first forest school program in the world for children who are deaf), perhaps in partnership with Nature Ninos, NM. This fundraising effort will go towards helping us to meet this goal of being a more welcoming program.
We humbly request your giving, both financially & energetically, in supporting SOL to get more children out into the forest! It costs $800 a year to send a Treeschooler to SOL one day a week, which works out to be $66 dollars a month. If you would like to sponsor a Treeschooler to attend SOL Forest School for a year, we promise that gift will have an enormous, positive impact on that child's life!
It also costs a lot to dress a child to be outside in all weather & this alone creates a barrier for most children in New Mexico. Please also consider sharing your own gently-used children's outdoor clothing & gear, &/or donate here to help us grow our gear library.
Full disclosure: SOL Forest School is a privately-owned LLC. The primary reason we are is because this way of being with preschool aged children- in the outdoors, all year-round, in all-weather- is still very, very new to the United States. There are rarely public funds or public programs available & hosting this kind of program is not cheap due to the insurance costs & the specialized training involved (truthfully, we barely earn enough to support teacher development & our Educators are lucky to make minimum wage, once we factor in the additional time & energy we put into the program beyond our hours in the forest spent with our Treeschoolers, yet our tuition remains too high for many to pay). Forbes magazine, Vogue magazine & National Public Radio all recently mentioned that Forest Schooling is a growing trend & that the Forest School pedagogy nourishes a child's body, mind & heart. We at Sol Forest School do "body, mind & heart" beautifully! This is our magic! This program IS our offering to our broken world. If you are passionate about social justice, earth stewardship (we grow future stewards of the earth!), young children & education, we hope you will consider donating generously to this fund.
THANK YOU for taking the time to read this, for sharing it amongst your friends & for donating, if you are able.
United-in-Nature,
SOL Forest School
www.solforestschool.com
https://www.facebook.com/soulfuloutdoorlearning/
https://www.forbes.com/sites/kerrymcdonald/2020/05/11/four-k-12-education-models-that-may-gain-popularity-during-covid-19/#60027d2c6b77
https://www.npr.org/2020/06/17/878205853/5-radical-schooling-ideas-for-an-uncertain-fall-and-beyond
https://www.vogue.com/article/forrest-school-covid-summer
Organizer
Sally Anderson
Organizer
Tijeras, NM