Glacier Park classroom: Institute has taught more than 20,000 kids

Every year when elementary school students from the Flathead Valley attend classes at the Glacier Institute's Big Creek Outdoor Education Center, instructors ask them the same question: How many have ever been to Glacier National Park?

Without fail, the answer is the same in each class. Only half the students, if not fewer, have ever set foot inside the park.

The Glacier Institute has been working for a quarter century to change that.

"That's the heart string," said Joyce Baltz, the Glacier Institute's executive director. "These kids are from right here, and many of them have never been in the national park."

The institute celebrates its silver anniversary this year. In 25 years, the nonprofit has taught more than 20,000 elementary students from the Flathead Valley.

The organization didn't start out as a vehicle for getting children into Glacier National Park.

Lex Blood, a geology instructor at Flathead Valley Community College, and Ursula Mattson, a wildlife biologist, envisioned a program that would introduce others to the science and wonder of the park.

At the time, Baltz said, there were few outdoor institutes in the nation.

"They envisioned if people came to learn on public lands, it would be great for all reasons," she said. "They had to convince the Park Service and the Forest Service that this was important."

When the government agencies offered their support in 1983, the Glacier Institute incorporated. The organization's first classes were held in 1984 at the Glacier Park Field Camp, a National Park Service facility just inside the park's West Glacier entrance.

Four years later, the institute acquired its Big Creek facility, which sits on Flathead National Forest land along the park's western border. When Big Creek opened, the institute was at last able to expand its class offerings to younger learners, which had been the organization's goal all along.

"It's important to get to kids at a [young] age," Baltz said. "That was the vision from the beginning."

The institute wanted to reach out to local students who might not otherwise visit the park. Teachers bought into the idea right away, Baltz said, and several have been part of Big Creek almost since it opened.

"The teachers have followed us for years," she said. "It's nice for teachers to literally close the science book and get on the bus."

Some longtime teachers have introduced new colleagues to the Glacier Institute. Rachel Stevens first heard about the institute from a fellow Lakeside Elementary teacher who has taken her classes to Big Creek for more than a decade.

Stevens, who taught in Phoenix before her current job teaching fifth grade at Lakeside, had never been on a field trip like the fifth-graders' annual trek to Big Creek. On her first trip there three years ago, she was impressed by the instructors' grasp on science, but she was equally excited about the life skills her students were learning.

Students spent days and nights together in Big Creek, sharing meals, cabins and outdoor adventures.

"They were learning about how to get along with others," Stevens said. "There are so many ulterior motives than just 'science] content."

She also saw students who had struggled in the classroom become people their peers admired at Big Creek.

"They're kids who maybe have a harder time working with other kids [in the classroom]. Cooperative group work is maybe not that good for them," Stevens said.

"But in the outdoor setting they rise to the occasion. They become leaders and work with other kids really well."

Stevens suspects it's the freedom of the Big Creek environment that creates the change in those students.

"It's the whole discovery process when you're outside," she said. "You investigate and dig into things in a different way than when you're using a textbook and a pencil and paper."

The institute depends on donors and members to keep its programs affordable for all students. Often, Baltz said, it's the children from low-income households who might not otherwise have the chance to visit the park.

"We want every kid to come," she said. "We keep the prices deliberately low, and we fundraise the difference."

Baltz is proud of the fact that the institute has never turned away a child who requested a scholarship. It has been a little more challenging in this economy, she admitted, but the organization has been able to offer at least partial scholarships.

"If kids can't afford to pay, we figure out a way to say yes," she said. "It's not always easy, but we do it."

The institute hopes to raise money for future students at its Silver Anniversary Gala, which will be held at 6 p.m. Sept. 26 in FVCC's Arts and Technology Building.

The event features live and silent auctions, Glacier Park history by local historian Bill Dakin, music by Grant Sorley and a performance by magician Dan Jimmerson.

Tickets are $75 per person and are available by calling the institute at 755-1211 or e-mailing register@glacierinstitute.org. Further information is available at www.glacierinstitute.org.

Money the event brings in will help future generations of Montanans experience Glacier National Park.

"Education is perpetual. We feel it can never be taken away from people," Baltz said. "If they have that love for the outdoors, how many people will they teach?"

Reporter Kristi Albertson may be reached at 758-4438 or by e-mail at kalbertson@dailyinterlake.com