Before the end of this school year Springhouse Middle School eighth grade students from Dan Christman’s science class began converting three-acres of wooded land behind the school into an outdoor environmental laboratory.

Caitlin Heffner, watershed specialist with the Lehigh County Conservation District, explained an environmental laboratory is an outdoor classroom which focuses primarily on the environmental sciences (ecology, natural resources, agriculture and humans and the environment).

Heffner said there will be seven stations in the environmental laboratory.

“The seven stations include landscaping with native plants, which have been planted throughout the lab, wildlife and its habitat, tree identification, bird blind, Hugelkultur (raised garden bed), a pollination zone and revitalization of the American Chestnut Tree,” she stated.

The Lehigh County Conservation District in partnership with the school received a $2,993 Environmental Education Grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection to install the environmental laboratory in the wooded land, Heffner said.

The conservation district applied for the grant for Springhouse in December 2014 after the school had a rain garden installed in October 2014 through a grant administered by the LCCD.

“The Department of Environmental Protection Environmental Education grant application was submitted including a history of the site, the project steps and activities, goals and objectives,” Heffner stated. “Teachers and students can use the environmental laboratory as part of the curriculum to supplement classroom sessions and/or in lieu of costly field trip.

“The lab is meant to enrich the current curriculum and provide hands-on learning through an interactive classroom.”

“The environmental laboratory can also be used for art; reading, writing and speaking; history; physical education, and math, technology and engineering,” she stated.

Guidance counselor Michael Gross also discussed the environmental laboratory.

“When Lehigh County Conservation District approached me with the opportunity to apply for the grant I jumped at the chance,” Gross said.

“The grant was used to pay for Lehigh County Conservation’s assistance with writing the grant and covered all the materials for the sign to explain what the purpose of the lab is, the bird blind, tree identification (posts and signs), the viewing window in the hugelkutlur, the birdhouses, Biltmore sticks (to measure tree diameter and height), bird feeders and all the newly planted trees, bushes and flowers.”

In his second year having the lab, Gross wanted to create an opportunity to link what is going on in the lab to the school’s science curriculum.

He said the environmental lab is a great contribution to the STEMM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math and Medical) initiative and connects to a wide variety of real-world applications and issues.

“My hope is that an authentic and hands on learning experience will help students to appreciate nature and the amazing things that happen there,” he said. “I also want to show students the benefits of preserving our natural resources and what we can all do to help the community around us.”

Gross doesn’t know who originally designed the environmental lab.

“All that was really there before I started was the walking trail,” he stated. “I designed all the lab stations and decided where they would go.

“My hope is to attract a lot of pollinators, birds and butterflies mostly.

“I had to be very particular with what I selected, I wanted everything to be Pennsylvania native and good for our area.”

The students planted several dogwoods, buttonbush and flowering crabapples.

”The hardwoods I planted are: sugar maple, red maple, white oak, shagbark hickory, American hornbean, American beech, American chestnut, sycamore and a few pine trees too,” Gross said.

Gross is also planning on planting Eastern red columbine, red milkweed, butterfly weed, New England Aster, partridge pea, lance leaf coreopsis, Spotted Joe Pye weed, Indian blanket, ox-eye sunflower, blazing star, wild perennial lupine, wild bergamot, evening primrose, beard tongue, black-eyed Susan, sweet coneflower, brown-eyed Susan and rigid Goldenrod.

The lab had red oak, bitternut hickory, hackberry and black walnut trees, he said.

Gross wanted to be involved with the lab because he was brought up appreciating nature and he realized most students today do not get many opportunities to interact with nature.

Gross said he received a lot of help from Parkland School District grounds crew, who donated a lot of time to help him with the project.

“I also had free help from John Gross, my brother, an Orefield Middle School teacher, who runs the Orefield Middle School environmental lab and Dan Christman, an eighth grade science teacher at Springhouse,” he said.

Gross said Eagle Scout Kevin Williams, has also been assisting him with the stations.