An environmental school that has served tens of thousands of teens and teachers will reopen following an uncertain year, thanks to an agreement between a conservatory group and the state.
The 72-year-old New Jersey School of Conservation will open its Stokes State Forest campus in May with limited programming, an advocacy group, The Friends of the School of Conservation, announced.
Montclair State University shuttered the school last spring and returned it to the state Department of Environmental Protection, its original operator. The lockdowns to combat the coronavirus outbreak had ravaged the university’s budget, the school said, prompting it to give up the 240-acre school.
But The Friends of the School of Conservation launched a letter writing campaign last spring and drafted a management plan for the property. Their work paid off, and they have announced an interim agreement with the Department of Environmental Protection.
“We are grateful to the Murphy administration and to the leadership of the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection for working with the Friends to reopen the NJSOC for the residents of New Jersey,” Kerry Kirk Pflugh, the group’s president, said in a statement.
“In less than a year, we were able to forge this extraordinary agreement thanks to the help of our advisers, Friends members, and the thousands of students, teachers and researchers across the state, nation and world who lobbied on behalf of the NJSOC.”
The school can access more than half its allotted acres for day programs, research, service projects and fundraising efforts, according to the group. It will also offer virtual courses pending their development.
The agreement is effective through the end of the year and could be renewed for two additional years. The group said it expects the DEP to seek proposals for a long-term lease agreement in the future.
A spokesperson for the DEP did not immediately confirm the details of the agreement or provide a statement Wednesday afternoon.
Science teachers and environmentalists were devastated from Montclair State announced it would sever ties with the school. Some said they became inspired to study environmental science after attending a field trip to the school decades earlier.
About 5,000 students took field trips to the school for hands-on courses in environmental science each year. They came from 15 of the state’s 21 counties, from Bordentown, Jersey City, Ho-Ho-Kus and more, to do field and lab work with environmental scientists. They canoed and hiked, shot arrows and worked together in team-building exercises.
The school also conducted research on endangered species and the effects of climate change on certain animals prior to its closure. It cost around $2 million to operate annually, but took in only about $600,000 from the educational programs each year. It had 18 employees.
When the school opened in 1949, it sought to educate the state’s future science teachers. But it began bringing teens to the grounds for experiential education and held professional development programs for teachers.
Now, it plans to continue professional programs for teachers and host family programs on climate change and other scientific topics. It will hold up to five programs per month, the group said.
“This temporary agreement is a first step in fully reopening the NJSOC,” Bernard Weintraub, an adviser to the group and lead negotiator for the access agreement, said in a statement. He expressed gratitude to the Department of Environmental Protection for “helping us to fulfill the promise made to the residents of New Jersey that they would have an environmental education field center in perpetuity.”
Our journalism needs your support. Please subscribe today to NJ.com.
Amanda Hoover may be reached at ahoover@njadvancemedia.com. Follow her on Twitter @amandahoovernj.