By Sara Marls

Stevens Point School District Environmental Education is about to hit the spotlight at the June 9 School Board meeting.

According to Karen Dostal, environmental education coordinator, the 2013-14 annual report is ready for presentation before the Board.

According to a memo from Dostal, Boston School Forest (BSF) staff ran 194 programs for pre-K through 9th grade students. Over 5,600 students and parents participated in the school forest programs.

The district’s Leave No Family Inside programs for the community continue to be popular. More than 250 students and adults participated in skiing, snowshoeing and various Earth Day programs, while over 1,700 children and adults used the BSF facility for camps, meetings and classes.

The total number of people served this past school year is 7,337.

The district’s cost of the programs held at the facility came to $3,106.37 from a budgeted amount of $3810. The program saw $3,913.82 in donations and almost $830 in grants. Rentals fees brought in $225 and solar energy production brought in $439.14.

The BSF staff this year also developed programming for all of the ninth grade students from P.J. Jacobs, which included pond studies lead by science teachers Kurt Freund and Patty McGibbon. Students also learned the basics of birding and participated in a role playing scenario called The World Game where they learned about world population, resource distribution and sustainability issues.