Maryland resident Elana Mintz is dedicated to uplifting the spirits of students, staff and parents through the joys and instructive benefits of outdoor learning. With Urban Adventure Squad (UAS), a nonprofit organization devoted to empowering D.C. youth through environmental exploration, students are integrated into their communities and spend quality time outside as they learn.
Mintz, founder and executive director of the nonprofit, moved to Washington, D.C., by way of New York in 1994. The District is where she started her family and Mintz explored the city with her children by walking along local bridges, waterways, and neighborhoods.
“Once I started thinking through Urban Adventure Squad, a lot of that [inspiration] emerged from having my own children and figuring out what I wanted their public education to look like, and what I wanted their time outside of school to look like, because none of that outdoor learning was happening,” said Mintz.
This year, Urban Adventure Squad celebrates 10 years of educating D.C. youth by using the city as a classroom. Four pillars of the UAS teaching model are focused on leveraging community resources, meticulous curriculum development, hands-on and physical learning, curiosity, and fun.
The nonprofit offers full-day programs, year-round, to elementary school students covering subjects such as science, history, math, art, engineering, and writing. Middle school students are also provided with special half-day programs with curriculum-aligned lessons.
Mintz explained UAS successfully sustains itself with the help of volunteers, donations, and private grants to spread outdoor learning opportunities throughout the District. This school year, the National Recreation Foundation supported UAS with a grant to develop an outdoor learning culture in D.C. Public Schools.
The Benefits of Outdoor Learning
Outdoors, students can connect with their neighborhoods, allowing children to identify transferable skills from lesson plans into their everyday lives.
“Every day I feel like there is an opportunity for me to learn how much the outdoors can really save us and nourish us,” Mintz told The Informer. “Once you allow children to move, address their social and emotional well-being, [then] their levels of engagement and the kinds of questions that children have when they’re outside are amazing.”
Outdoor learning benefits children’s mental, emotional, and physical health.
According to research from the National Wildlife Federation, 78% of children who spend regular time in unstructured outdoor play are better able to concentrate and perform better in the classroom. Also, 75% of students who spend regular time outdoors tend to be more creative and better at problem-solving in the classroom.
Environmental education prompts collaboration with group work, cultivates critical thinking and problem-solving skills, nurtures community involvement, and active citizenship, ultimately creating positive memories and expanding learning capabilities for students.
Throughout the school year, UAS partners with schools in all eight wards, like C.W. Harris Elementary School in Ward 7 to foster trust between the organization and teachers to continue lesson plans in outdoor settings.
Last week, in partnership with C.W. Harris, Urban Adventure Squad took students on an hour-long walk around their school’s garden and rain garden to learn about the impact of rain on the pollution of the Anacostia watershed.
Using sign language of the letters ‘P’ and ‘I’ students were encouraged to identify pervious and impervious surfaces to learn about how pollutants travel into the watershed.
Within each garden, students were able to acknowledge how trash and toxic chemicals pollute local riverways.
The goal of UAS is to motivate students to learn in an environment that feels safe, relaxed, and welcoming, while creating an outdoor learning culture that is equitable and sustainable for public schools.
“Outdoor learning done equitably is possible in every single public school in the United States, and in order to do that you have to overturn this idea that we have used to justify how we form our schools,” said Mintz.
‘Favorite Day of School So Far‘
Urban Adventure Squad sees over a thousand students per year and is estimated to see over 1,500 students working side by side with teachers on expanding their curriculums.
Randi Jones has been a teacher for Urban Adventure Squad for almost three years. Jones is passionate about providing both students and teachers with the freedom of outdoor learning.
“A lot of the time we are teaching kids things that I didn’t know about until I wrote the lesson plans, and that they didn’t know about. So, they are bringing that new knowledge into the next generation, which gives me hope,” said Randi Jones.
Alexis Hochgertel, an environmental studies student from American University who first started volunteering for Urban Adventure Squad, and then transitioned into an official teaching role.
Hochgertel gravitated to the passion of her fellow instructors, teachers, and students to learn about the environment. Through her experience working in programs, Hochgertel was touched by the enthusiastic feedback from her students.
“Kids will be like ‘Aw this is my favorite day of school so far,’” Hochgertel told The Informer.
