Students in a previous year of Conservation Leadership School at Goshen College’s Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center near Wolf Lake pose with a bark hut they made as part of Nature Play Day, where they taught and facilitated outdoor exploration with young children. Photo provided.

News Release

WOLF LAKE — Goshen College is offering a Conservation Leadership School for upcoming high school juniors and seniors.

It takes place at the college’s Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center. Students will camp and stay overnight and explore the world of natural resources and conservation June 7-11.

Students will canoe across the top of the watershed, sample wetlands for aquatic macro-invertebrates and get a taste of careers like botany, land management or sustainable farming.

The program costs only $25, including meals and lodging, with full scholarships available. Interested students need to fill out an application online and have a teacher or mentor submit a short letter of recommendation by Friday, May 7, at www.goshen.edu/merrylea/cls.

Throughout the week, CLS students are surrounded by the 1,189 acres of forests, prairies, wetlands, a sustainable farm and other ecosystems of Merry Lea. This not only provides the immersive learning setting for the program, but is also the backdrop for everyday connections to the plant and animal inhabitants of these landscapes.

The main goal of this program is for young people to become better equipped to serve
as leaders in environmental settings.

“I think it is very important to lead by example, showing that it is possible and plausible to live sustainably,” said one participant from a previous year. “Showing leadership means setting an example for people to follow. It means being the first one to step up and do something about a problem,” reflected another student.

Merry Lea is located just south of Wolf Lake, halfway between Goshen and Fort Wayne. Directions and updates are available at goshen.edu/merrylea or the Merry Lea Facebook page.