Presentation

Tree planting can help communities achieve many resiliency goals such as cooling heat islands, reducing stormwater floods, and building neighborhood cohesion.

The USA-NPN brings together citizen scientists, government agencies, non-profit groups, educators and students of all ages to monitor the impacts of climate change on plants and animals in the United States.

Ash tree species in North America are under mortal threat from the Emerald Ash Borer (EAB), now in 35 states and five Canadian provinces. There are ongoing efforts to conserve this native tree species by producing genetically diverse, resistant seedlings suitable for restoring ash on the landscape. Identifying “lingering ash” is a critical component of amplifying these efforts, and this presentation will explain the narrow window of time in which urgent actions are needed to discover and preserve these individuals.

A crucial function of education programming in public gardens is generating relationships between children and nature. We have a unique opportunity to personalize the horticultural aspects of our institutions. In this panel workshop, three practitioners will offer their experiences of creating play-based outdoor initiatives. The aim of each is to engage children and families, foster curiosity and discovery, and ultimately promote lifelong relationships with nature.

Is your educational programming prepared for the coming “elder boom”? Every day, 10,000 Americans reach the age of 65 and the fastest growing demographic in this country is women over age 85. To remain vital to audiences, public gardens must account for these population trends in program offerings. Accordingly, gardens must also consider the unique needs and opportunities of an older adult audience in program design in order to create lasting connections to nature. 

Phytoremediation is a green technology that utilizes specialized trees to remediate contaminated soils across the rural to urban continuum.

Connecting people to nature when you have a cave on your grounds is easy…or is it? Learn about the ups and downs of partnering with other organizations to highlight a special feature on your grounds. Partnerships can be a great way to reach audiences that may not otherwise have an opportunity to visit your center. 

How public gardens and arboreta evaluate their education programs determines the stories they can tell about those programs’ ability to positively impact their targeted audience and the broader community, and to build collaborations with research institutions. The feedback evaluations provide is critical to improving and adapting programs to have broader and more meaningful impacts. 

Story is a powerful, provocative interpretive medium in botanical gardens. Plants already have a hard time attracting the interest of a plant-blind public, and lists of facts do little to bring them alive. Botanical gardens and their collections are full of meaning, narrative and history interleaved with personal perspectives. Stories help us uncover this and connect visitors to nature and the richness of our plant collections.

Green Bay Botanical Garden continually strives to meet the wants and needs of its community, but these wants and needs are changing. In the summer of 2018, the Garden hosted its first internationally touring exhibit, and was surprised by the most popular ways that guests interacted with it.