CORE MEETING MINUTES
May 24, 2017, 4 – 5:30 pm

Location:  Flathead Conservation District, 133 Interstate Ln, Kalispell
Attendees: Denny Olson, Kathy Martin, Monica Elser, Brian Schwartz, Sheena Pate, Cynthia Ingelfinger, Laura Rognerud,

General Updates

  • Glacier Children’s Museum (link to flyer) concept presentation by Savannah Andrasko. She is looking for volunteers to join the board, work on committees, spread the word and fundraise/donate. She has held 3 community meetings and gathered 7 people for the board. They will be filing for non profit status soon and have begun fundraising.
  • Whitefish Center for Sustainability: Whitefish Schools received the Green Ribbon Schools Award this year. Ryder DeLaloye cannot join the meeting today, but is hoping to join the next CORE meeting.
  • Forest for Every Classroom Planning (FFEC).
    FEEC will be pushed back a year. The planning year will be 2018 and the first year of the actual workshop will be 2019. Federal budget cuts will impact the $20,000 the Forest Service had to support the program. Other funding opportunities are being looked at. Joanie in Missoula is looking into some perspective grants. And we are looking into other funding sources as well. At this time, three organizations (Flathead Lakers, MCC, and possibly Western Montana Learning Center) are interested in being the non-profit partner. The later start will give us time to flesh this out. There is currently $12,000 form Conservancy already slated for this project.
  • Arbor Day was April 28th, and Kalispell Parks and Rec. sponsored the event for 370 Kalispell School District 3rd graders at Kids Sport in Kalispell. There were 15 different learning stations and a tree planting ceremony. The weather held and the event was a huge success.
  • Earth Day in Whitefish was a huge success with 48 booths and 800-1,000 people estimated. This year seemed like a better location for the event with more exposure. Wild Wings was a hit. The PA system needs to be worked on but having the middle school helpers was great. Matt Folz at Xanterra is accepting feedback. [email protected]
  • Forestry Expo – Over 1300 5th graders from three counties participated; the soggy, muddy grounds at the site didn’t detract fromt eh fun outdoor learning going on. Thanks to the over 100 people from the area agencies, organization, businesses that donatred their time for a successful week-long event for 5th graders and the Saturday event for families. Over 600 people visited the expo site during the Saturday event with no rain! A vast majority of visitors were families. The expo planning committee welcomes interested people that want to help out. They are looking for someone to lead/coordinate the Wildlife Station next year for the 5th grade portion of the event and someone interested in scheduling the 5th grade classes.
  • We need to add Margosia Jadkowski, the Program Director at Whitefish Legacy Partners, to our CORE email list.
  • We discussed possibly revisiting the CORE meeting times to potentially a little earlier (3pm?).
  • Flathead Lake Biological Station and Flathead Lakers is hosting a Science on Tap about loons in Montana on Tuesday, June 6th at 6pm.
  • Flathead Biological Station is having an Open House on August 2nd at 1pm. Come tour the campus and learn more about the great science and education happening at Yellow Bay.

Flathead CORE Website

  • Steve Prather is now helping with the CORE website. We took the “login” link off the home page so to work on the website, you need to go to: flatheadcore.org/wp-login.php
  • We also updated the contact for Loon Lake 4-H camp.
  • Steve said he would try to get the “Frog Day” post updated and add the flyer.
  • Cynthia has been added as am “editor”.
  • We’re setting up another meeting time to really think about adding Google analytics, updating our theme, and just finding out how much folks are using the site.
  • Melissa, Cynthia and Sheena offered to take the lead on the CORE website
  • We talked about our News section and how we have featured environmental education themed blogs. We could add some blogs highlighting a different CORE group and their offerings. We can toss around some ideas at the September meeting.

Trunk Workshop:

  • Save the date for the 2017 Trunk workshop on Thursday, October 19th.
  • Monica Elser asked about expanding the trunk workshop to include featuring our organizations’ field trip/environmental education programming. We discussed possibly having a separate event in February that would feature all the environmental education opportunities for teachers, families and citizens in the valley. NW Educators Coop might be a good organizer/host for that event. Eliza’s replacement starts this summer.
  • Sheena, Cynthia and Carolan are organizing this year’s Trunk Workshop
  • Lone Pine is a possible location for the workshop or the United Way Building in Kalispell.