Nature in Harmony Exchange Project
An Andover Trees United youth project, registered with Dr Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots ‘Mission Possible’ programme and working in collaboration with The Corcovado Foundation, Costa Rica.
Created in 2020, in partnership with the Corcovado Foundation in Costa Rica, this project provides opportunities for youth and young adults to develop their local and global environmental and ecological knowledge and to learn new skills.
Young people have the opportunity to enhance their knowledge and understanding of ecology and conservation through wildlife surveying and developing their own mini projects, connected to nature and tailored to their own interests. They discuss wider environmental issues such as sustainability, climate change, and the mitigating need for trees, as well as gaining volunteering experience, training, enjoyment, and enhanced well-being.
Through communication between the young people from Andover and the young people from Drake Bay in Costa Rica, participants are able to share and compare their findings with each other, develop friendships, and learn more about the differences and similarities between our environments, lifestyles and cultures.
We open applications for each new cohort in summer, for an October start. Applicants will be invited to attend the September session in which the group lead a walk-and-talk around Harmony Woods at ATU’s annual AGM.
We are empowering decision makers of tomorrow
to become environmental leaders in their communities.
Programme Structure
Year runs October to September. Sessions take place in Harmony Woods on the second Saturday of each month. You must be committed to attending at least 9 out of 12 sessions.
Monthly activities focus on woodland management, ecology, and conservation.
Work on your own mini research project throughout.
Exchange communication with young people from Costa Rica.
Annual summer overnight camp in Harmony Woods on the Friday before a usual session.
Year 1 - Earn a Junior Forester Award, and start working towards a John Muir Discovery Award.
Year 2 - Devise and conduct (as a group) a habitat creation project, and create a maintenance plan for it. Complete the John Muir Discovery Award.
Year 3 - Step into a young leader role, assisting the volunteer leaders and the younger participants.
The youth group sessions are planned and run by volunteers at no monetary cost to participants. Therefore part of the Exchange Project commitment is that participants volunteer at least 12 hours a year at ATU workdays and events. The easiest way to do this is by staying on after the monthly Saturday morning session (9:30am - 12pm) to join in the last hour of ATU’s monthly Saturday Community Workday till 1pm, but there are many other options.
Participants automatically join the ATU youth team - a Jane Goodall’s Roots & Shoots affiliated group.
The project’s first 2-week trip to Costa Rica July-August 2022
New skills, new friends, new qualifications, and new opportunities!
Working with the Corcovado Foundation
The Corcovado Foundation is a key player in the strengthening of the protected wild areas, the promotion of environmental education, sustainable tourism and community participation throughout the sustainable use of the natural resources in the South Pacific area of Costa Rica.
We are honoured to be working with an organisation whose aims and values align so closely with our own and are excited to see where our new friendship takes us.
Taken from the Corcovado Foundation website:
“We are local activists dedicated to the preservation and conservation of the fragile biodiversity of Costa Rica. We do this by providing environmental education and empowering local communities, especially women, girls and boys.”
What we do
We use education to address and promote the involvement and call to action of local communities. We support governmental and non-governmental entities in the search for sustainable, balanced and equitable development for them. Our focus is local, but our impact is global.
Our mission
We strive to protect Costa Rica’s natural heritage for future generations, through its sustainable development, by promoting education and community empowerment, the strengthening of protected wildlife areas and the promotion of tourism.”
