the semester begins!!!
The 2015 Spring Semester of the Phoenix Field School has begun! The five new crew members are off to a great start. Here is their account of their first two weeks.
Week one was our orientation week. We went to the Bureau of Land Management to meet with Patrick Putnam, the Associate District Manager, who took us throughout the facility to mjeet other agency employees we will be working with during the semester. We also went on our first group hike with Trevor Knight, SCA Regional Program Manager, to Fat Man’s Pass in the South Mountain area. During the hike we identified common desert plants and searched for petroglyphs. We ended the week at Phoenix College by meeting our instructors, Roberto Villegas-Gold and Dave Brown.
Week two started with a trip to the Audubon at the Rio Salado where we met with Tice Supplee. Tice taught us how the Audubon has been able to bring back over 150 different bird species to the area, and how to properly record our observations in a field journal.
We then went on our first group backpacking trip in the Superstition Mountains with our Outdoor Adventure Skills instructor Dave Brown, where we focused on following the principles of Leave No Trace. Each of us taught a lesson one of the principles to the rest of the group. After setting up camp at Hackberry Springs, we learned the different ways to filter and purify water. The next morning, we packed our supplies and hiked out to civilization. We came in as simple backpackers, and we left as Leave No Trace champions.
