Imagine holding a pair of binoculars for the first time ever.
Holding them up to your eyes and looking around. Spying a bird, one you JUST learned the name of. Getting excited and pointing to it while shouting to your friends that you just saw a bird through the binoculars.
Then you walk with a new friend, hand in hand, to the craft area.
You look at a table filled with…trash. But soon you are encouraged to get creative. You turn that trash into bird feeders to attract the birds you just learned about.
After a lunch that fills your belly, you laugh with your new friends. The big belly laughs that make you fall over. While talking about things the grown ups will never understand. From there you get to sit outside in the sun and learn about mindfulness.
There you are, sitting on a yoga mat in the sun.
One hand on your chest and another on your stomach. Taking deep breaths and learning how to sit in the calmness. You feel a calmness within you, but one you haven’t gotten to sit with in this day in age where we are always so busy.
Then it’s time to get messy — the good kind of messy.
You smoosh your hands in paint, feel the coldness of it squish in between your fingers, and use those hands to create art. You get to put those paint covered hands on a poster, a poster you are excited to show your adult when they come to pick you up at the end of the day.
You go to bed exhausted and happy. Happier knowing you get to go back tomorrow to learn more about the environment, through games and crafts and hands-on activities. All while creating lasting memories.
From 2016-2019 GLS held Earth Camp, a summer camp for Detroit youth. Cohorts of students would attend a one week session at no cost to them, and learn about environmental sustainability. These cohorts of students got to enjoy something that many of their peers don’t get the chance to experience.
This is why GLS is hoping to bring back Earth Camp for 2023 — because these memories and experiences are ones that last a lifetime to the youth that get to experience them.
If you want to support Earth Camp, considering making a year end donation today.