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[John]: The Center has been in existence since nineteen seventy seven
and over that time has hosted probably over a hundred thousand students who have
been through here for a half week or a week at a time
the reason students come down here is because of the fact that
we offer opportunities that aren't available in the normal
classroom setting
if you go back a few
hundred years, the outdoors
was the classroom back for thousands of years
before we had schools in classrooms we learned a lot of of what we know about our environment
from the outdoors, from observations and experiences that
people had how they grew up with their families so
the center is an effort to try to
bring that back into the education experiences of students.
Typically students will come here with a classroom with their teacher
and because of state rules and regulations that over oversee our facility
they're required to have at least one adult for every ten children so
generally what happens is that a teacher will recruit volunteers either
parents or high school students or college students
who come down to help compliment their
educational staff to make this
an experience and also make it as safe experience for the students
the center is unique also in the fact that it has a wide variety of habitats and
and climates, environments that the groups can enjoy while they're here
in my involvement with many other centers around the state
I have yet to find the diversity that we have here at the Ebersole Center
We have our own eight acre prairie, we have a
Beech-Maple climax forest, we have a fourteen acre
private lake that is
completely on district property so that we don't have any encroachment from
cabins or cottages that you might find on many other lakes these days
so it's a very natural lake. We have
a swamp and a marsh area so there are at least
seven or eight different kinds of habitats that
children and adults can come and explore and become acquainted with. These are unique because
it is unusual to find
this many different kinds of of things in one
hundred fifty eight acre
parcel of land
the other part that makes the center unique is that we
have what we feel is very
qualified and
exceptional staff to assist groups who come to the Center.
Part of the rationale or philosophy behind the development of the Center was that the
visiting groups would be
primarily responsible for their program and
we would augment that by providing certified staff where visiting teachers might not
have someone such as an
aquatics supervisor which in many cases these days
it would be hard to find
but by not having one, it would eliminate the opportunity for students to enjoy the
canoeing and the aquatic activities
that we feel are important part of our programs.
We provide
two naturalists, or two planning specialists, who have those certifications those
as aquatic supervisors. They also are certified school bus drivers because the Center is
uniquely located here in western Michigan
among the Yankee Springs acreage and the Barry County State Game area where we have
another twenty thousand acres of
land and state trails that we can
have available to our groups that visit the Center. We also are short distance
from Lake Michigan within an hour's drive we can be on the dunes
and talking about sand dune ecology and the evolution of the Great Lakes so we just are in
a prime spot to be able to enjoy
much of the natural history that we have here in Michigan,
What makes Michigan unique.
The buildings were constructive out of cement block which maybe don't have quite the
aesthetic appeal, but they are
very safe in terms of fire safety
we have dormitories which allows for
good supervision of students at all times so that we
don't have students alone in cabins, by themselves
where we could have problems develop so
the whole design of the Center was meant to make it a safe experience for kids so
that they would go home
feeling that they not only had learned a lot and have fun but that the families and the
parents could feel that they were in good hands while
their children were here at their Ebersole Center.
[Pam]: As a Lansing School District Teacher, I feel that bringing my students to camp helps
to enhance
the curriculum program that is on-going in the Lansing School District.
I feel that it also provides
our students with a great week of personal growth that I see as a teacher when they get
back into the classroom
and all of the great problem solving, decision making
activities that they have here at the camp.
[children talking]
[children talking]
[children talking]
[Kim]: Right now they're trying to
walk across a field
on a set of trollies, they may not,
they're feet may not touch the ground
a couple minutes ago we saw them bickering and my job as a facilitator is to try to get them
to see that
the bickering isn't going to work, that they're going to have to work together as a team the
whole, this whole course is about them working together as a team.
They are learning that
they need other people, in life,
they can't do everything by themselves.
If they're going to be successful at things they're going to have to cooperate with other people. That means that they're
listening to each others' ideas and
they're being tolerant of those ideas,
trying those ideas, maybe if they have different ideas, they solve,
they decide whose ideas going to get
tried in a democratic way.
[Tami]: The ideal is to get these kids to be able to work together
and to learn how to support each other to communicate with one another to be able to
solve problems and this is just one of the tools we use to be able to do so
it's like an element that brings out those abilities within themselves to work on problems and be able to work together.
[Pam]: many teachers say, "what was magic, we have magic down there"
and I could never understand what they meant by the magic they said, "no my students are very
different", such as our special Ed teachers
and I guess this is really true. Children, we get this response from parents
of the maturity the responsibility that this child had
during that week of camp, they had to make some real good decisions on their own
and not with
lots of their parents around and other people influencing. They had to
really makes a great decisions.
So I think as a teacher,
this experience makes me feel closer to my students
it also
gives my students, I think, a lot more self-confidence
and understanding about themselves and relationships to other students in the classroom.
[Jo Ann]: if you're interested in booking a date at the Ebersole Center
all you need to do is call, in Lansing, five one seven
seven five five, five thousand
or two six nine, seven nine two
six two nine four
or visit our web site: ebersole.lansingschools.net
The Ebersole Center is for all school groups
within the Lansing School District and
non-districts schools within Michigan
any groups of thirty five or more may book the Center
for weekends.
[children]: Making connections with the
Natural World at Camp Ebersole.
[children laughing]