NAI Blog

Today, August 31, 2010 would have been my father’s 100^th birthday. Unfortunately he didn’t make it to 100, but he accomplished a lot in the years he had. As the first municipal park naturalist in the western US, he helped break ground for a lot of us that followed down that path. That path has grown, perhaps even split in a few places over the years. And there’s no doubt this path is sometimes rocky with steep slopes and lots of fascinating twists and turn—but then any curved path holds the most interest.

In the first half of the 20^th century the people that interpreted natural history were commonly referred to as naturalists or nature guides, and they often came from a different place than today’s interpreters. The naturalist was often a field scientist, with a detailed knowledge of botany, zoology, geology, paleontology or other formal “ologies.” Colleagues that interpreted cultural history often came from a formal background in history, anthropology, archeology or related disciplines and went by the title of historian. In other words, without the formal discipline of interpretation in that era, naturalists and historians came from other formal academic disciplines. For example, Dr. Loye Miller and Dr. Harold Bryant who initiated interpretive programs for the National Park Service in Yosemite were both zoology professors from UC Berkeley.

My father was cut from that same cloth. He was a talented botanist and ornithologist that started out working as a field scientist and collector for museums like the American Museum of Natural History and the California Academy of Sciences. But there was something different about some of these naturalists. Their mastery of the subject matter was driven by this intense sense of discovery and curiosity, and often fueled an incredible sense of awe about the world around them—the same qualities that create some of our most inspired interpreters. This is perhaps where the path split from the technically proficient naturalists to branch off toward today’s interpreters. My father made that split in the 1940s when he began doing interpretive programs at Lakeside Park in Oakland, California. On a national/international scale we saw people like Rachel Carson, Jacques Cousteau, Aldo Leopold and many others with solid academic credentials turn toward connecting nature to the larger public, following in the footsteps of John Muir and Enos Mills. Parallel efforts brought cultural history and anthropology out of the halls of academia to make cultural heritage meaningful for the larger American public.

I was always a bit disappointed that my father didn’t consider himself an interpreter. He was always at home with any group of birdwatchers or botanists, but felt a little ill at ease at a gathering of contemporary interpreters. I think it may have been that so many of us also have backgrounds in communications, sociology, psychology or other areas of social sciences—perhaps we just seemed like a slightly different species. We’ve certainly added more layers of technology, methodology, research findings and evaluation to the tool kit of today’s interpreter, but our work still revolves around the fundamental relationship of people and resources. Even though many of those formal naturalists or historians can tell spell-binding stories or answer nearly any question you can think of regarding their resource, I always fear we may leave them behind if we’re not careful to acknowledge them as peers and colleagues. They are a big part of our professional heritage and we need to build on their good work, not leave it behind.

I’m willing to bet that wherever you practice, whatever your place or resource may be, there are people that have gone before you that were passionate scientists and historians, that discovered and described the unique nature of your resource. I would urge you to find those people, talk with them (if they’re still alive) or read their work, and dig through the layers of technical information to the deeper sense of discovery that drove their passion. That’s where you can tap into some very real and authentic inspiration to interpret your resource.

As for me, every time I’m looking for a little inspiration I just have to think back to a little boy sitting next to his dad in the hollowed stump of an ancient redwood tree in the Oakland hills, listening to stories of grizzly bears and lumberjacks. We all have a chance to pass that inspiration on to the children that will follow us. If you do it well, perhaps some child out there will celebrate your 100^th birthday.

—Jim Covel

Bison in Yellowstone National Park.

The U.S. Government and President Obama are soliciting ideas about protecting the places we love in the nation. There are public hearings being held all over the United States and their America’s Great Outdoors Initiative website allows you to post your ideas. I posted my ideas there as follows.

I find the comments on my post there interesting for they reflect the broad range of thinking in the U.S. about government intervention and shared responsibility. Some do not want the government in our lives in any manner whatever – no taxes, no public education, just NO.

Those of us who love parks, wilderness, natural areas, clean air, clean water and a healthy environment know that the shared responsibility for those must depend on all of us. Leaving people to their own with no protection of natural resources would doom mankind to an early extinction at our own hands. There are those who would cut every last tree, mine every mountain and drain every oil basin, no matter what the damage to our land, air and water.

A hundred years ago most Americans lived on farms and learning about food, land and energy was a part of everyday life. Young people today assume that food comes from grocery stores and energy comes from wall sockets. How would they learn about the real sources. Simcity and similar video games do teach about such things in a virtual environment, but nothing helps you understand how the world works as well as hands-on experiences with the real places and things.

I would like to see every 18-year old give some period of time to her/his community, parks, non-profit service organizations or military service with no exemptions at all. We would all learn earlier in our work lives what value there is in public service. It would provide a valuable opportunity for contextual learning in all directions. Military personnel face those realities on our behalf.

During the hard times of the Great Depression, my father worked for the Works Progress Administration (WPA) cutting trees in Illinois. He had a 7^th grade education and was unemployed with three children to feed. He used to complain of the long days of outdoor labor and low pay but later would brag of the good work that was done and the value of a job of any kind in those dark days.

In my first job as a park ranger and visitor center manager, I was very aware that the visitor center was built by the Civilian Conservation Corps as a picnic shelter. Later walls were added along with exhibits and a visitor contact area. I often had young workers from Youth Conservation Corps or Young Adult Conservation Corps helping me. I’ve written before in this blog about the great experiences with those programs. They give young people a better understanding of how the world really functions. All the resources we use in life still come from the Earth.

The America’s Great Outdoors Initiative is a great chance for you to share your ideas or give your view on the ideas of others. It is especially a good time to share the value of outdoor experiences for young people to learn about our planet. I welcome whatever judgment you make of my suggestions.

-Tim Merriman

For the past 26 years the Monterey Bay Aquarium has been the official orphanage and hospital for sea otters in California. During that time over 500 sea otters have been brought in to the Aquarium’s Sea Otter Research & Conservation (SORAC) program. Some of these have been adults that were hit by boats or exhibiting symptoms of disease or parasite infestation. Many have been pups that were separated from mom during storms or mom died before the pup was old enough to be on its own.

In recent weeks we received two new sea otter orphans with an interesting connection—in both cases their mothers had been killed by great white sharks. We’ve known for years that white sharks will occasionally bite a sea otter. This has never quite made sense to me as the larger white sharks that feed on marine mammals seem to go for seals and sea lions that have a lot of blubber. There’s not really any fat on a sea otter, not many calories for a hungry shark looking for energy. In any case, this is a serious matter for the otter and may prove fatal—but not always. Which brings me to the story of Pirate, a sea otter that was part of our SORAC program several years ago.

Pirate came to us as a pup and went spent some time at the Aquarium growing up and learning the survival skills that every successful sea otter practices. We released Pirate in Monterey Bay, and he spent a little time hanging around the kelp beds near the Aquarium, then moved on. All seemed to be going well until we got a call one day regarding an injured sea otter. When we retrieved the animal, it was Pirate! He had been bitten by a white shark and survived with a few lacerations. Our veterinarian, Dr. Murray, is an expert with sea otters, and was able to stitch up Pirate’s wounds. A few weeks of healing and Pirate was ready for life back in Monterey Bay. A happy ending to a close encounter with a great white shark…almost.

Less than a year later, Pirate was seen swimming right off the Aquarium deck, and something wasn’t right. His forearm appeared to be injured. Pirate was easily captured and brought back to Dr. Murray to see what was going on. His forearm was chewed up—several bone fractures and deep lacerations with evidence once again that this was the work of a great white shark! Our guess is that Pirate saw the shark coming this time and straight-armed the shark, perhaps saving his life but sacrificing a limb. This damage was going to take more than a few stitches to repair this time. Otters rely extensively on their forelimbs to pick up shellfish, retrieve stones, and to crack the shells of their food against the stones. In short, they can’t eat without strong forearms, and otters eat constantly. So the only option was to try to repair Pirate’s forearm.

Working with a veterinary orthopedic surgeon, Dr. Murray conducted what was the most extensive surgery ever performed on a sea otter at that time. Plates and screws were used to secure the fragmented bones in Pirate’s forearm. Many stitches later, Pirate was back on the road to recovery once again. Regular observation with an infrared camera helped measure how much heat was being lost where the fur was shaved for surgery. (Sea otters rely on their fur for insulation in that cold ocean water since they don’t have fat or blubber.) In the next few weeks Pirate’s fur was growing back and the bones were knitting. The SORAC team was heartened to see Pirate begin using his repaired forearm to start foraging and feeding again. It was time once again for Pirate to return to Monterey Bay.

It seemed like Pirate had some fateful connection to Great White Sharks, and he ran out of happy endings a few months later. We received a report of an injured sea otter on a local beach. When the SORAC team arrived, they found Pirate. He had yet a third encounter with a great white, and this time his injures were so massive that he didn’t survive.

Pirate had made history in the sea otter world. He had survived two shark attacks.  He made a significant contribution to our veterinary knowledge of treating sea otters, spending more time in surgery than any other sea otter. Moreover, Pirate’s fighting spirit was an inspiration for our SORAC team members that fight every day for the survival of sea otters.

—Jim Covel

Chief of Interpretation Larry Frederick orients us to the popular Sheep Lakes area of Rocky Mountain National Park.

NAI just finished hosting the Civic Tourism III Conference in Fort Collins and it was very exciting. Despite light attendance of 63 agency staffers, interpreters, convention and visitor bureau staff and community volunteers, those present were enthusiastic about doing more to help communities have the kind of tourism they want.

Dan Shilling’s book, Civic Tourism: The Poetry and Politics of Place, was given to each attendee. The book emphasizes that civic tourism should include the triple bottom line of equity (social), environment and economics, invest in the story and connect with the public. Tourism is one of the top three economic forces in every state in the U.S., but there is no cabinet level position for tourism in the federal government. Many states have a tourism office that only spends money on advertising. They want more people to come but do not invest in development of the “STORY,” the product, the visitor experience, the attractions.

The Estes Park Museum tells the story of the community very well.

At Civic Tourism III we had a full day of mobile workshops that took groups out to Blackhawk/Central City, Estes Park and Fort Collins with varied attractions and tourism hosts. We wanted to study and compare communities who encourage tourism and learn what we could from them. Blackhawk is a gambling and mining town. Estes Park is a gateway to Rocky Mountain National Park and has always been a tourist town. Fort Collins has a central theme of “where renewal is a way of life with a focus on “Beets, Brews and Bikes.” The sugar beet industry was the main community support for decades, but is gone. Micro-breweries like New Belgium and Odell’s are a part of the current lifestyle with their tasting rooms and unique stories. The lifestyles of the community today are very much about renewal and sustainability.

Dave DiMatteo at New Belgium interprets their story and core values.

We took the participants to New Belgium, where they interpret their beer with the story of founder Jeff Lebesch bicycling across Belgium, meeting brewmeisters and doing lots of tasting. Each employee gets a free trip to bicycle across Belgium at their five-year anniversary. It is  likely the “greenest” brewery in the nation with its own wind farm for electricity generation.  They have made sustainability and wise use of resources part of their core values along with bicycle events (Tour de Fat), employee ownership and a rich culture of storytelling. They tell their story very well.

One enduring observation of the three communities visited and the many communities discussed was the lack of a town’s abilities to tell the story on the streets. Estes Park explained they get three million visitors downtown but only about 12,000 at the local museum, which tells the story of Estes very well. It’s three blocks from the high traffic zones.

Can you tell the community story on the streets and why should you? Towns usually have a unique, authentic story or stories that arise from their natural and cultural assets and history. Often these days the story is covered up or lost in the melee of highways, franchise stores and strangely themed neighborhoods. James Howard Kuntsler described this phenomenon in his book, The Geography of Nowhere.  If we don’t tell our story on the streets, we may be a “been there, done that” visitor experience, another generic community. Most will not visit the local museum and dig out the deeper identity of the community.

A city interpretive guide starts our walking tour near the Roman Baths.

I have tried to think of where I’ve seen a town’s story thoughtfully told at the street level in diverse ways. Providence, Rhode Island, and the Blackstone Valley do a good job with their visitor center museum combination. Mystic, Connecticut, has incredible attractions and some downtown interpretive signage that shares their rich history. Bath, England, has wonderful street interpretive tours that engage visitors with their unique history. Singapore has interesting signage on their major streets that tell the fascinating story of how a trading post turned into a major seaport and industrial city-nation in a fairly short period of time.

Interpretive planning has largely been focused on sites like parks, zoos, historic houses, museums and aquariums in the past. In recent years the Scenic Byways Resource Center has introduced corridors and communities to interpretive planning as an opportunity to share their stories. A very few CVBs like Great Bend Kansas have been out front acquiring interpretive planning skills to plan holistic experiences for visitors. Kris Collier as President and CEO of the Great Bend CVB is a Certified Interpretive Trainer and Planner who works with local attractions to build a culture of collaboration among the rural communities in her region. It can be done, but it takes leadership.

It is exciting to think about what our diverse towns and communities might be like if they embraced their local stories and became skilled at telling them. NAI’s interpretive planning courses can be hosted anywhere and the towns and cities of North America pose a great opportunity. We need to put our stories on the streets, but we have to plan it and not just hope it happens.

-Tim Merriman

In 1980 a horror film was released entitled “The Fog.” In this film a small town on the California coast was enshrouded in fog at night. As the fog rolled in, it brought with it the spirits of mariners lost in a nearby shipwreck. I’m not sure which was more troublesome to the town’s residents—the spirits or the thick fog itself. Either way, it made an interesting plot if you enjoy scary movies.

2010 may go down as the summer of fog here on the central California coast. Fog was our constant companion nearly every day in July, and so far that trend is continuing into August. A persistent trough of low pressure off the California coast has been building a fog bank nearly 3,000 feet thick throughout the summer. Summer temperatures are averaging 2-3 degrees Fahrenheit lower in San Francisco, and Los Angeles is also experiencing an unusually cool summer.

If you’re living in most other parts of the United States, you may be experiencing one of the hottest summers on record. I’ve talked to quite a few visitors from the East Coast and Midwest that came to escape a persistent heat wave in their home region. As far as they’re concerned, our cool, foggy summer is one of the greatest tourist attractions California has to offer this year.

While one heat wave or cold snap doesn’t connote a change in climate, these phenomena may be connected in some ways to the larger issue of climate change. As we add more heat energy to our atmosphere, we’re providing additional energy to high and low pressure systems, more moisture through increased evaporation. You might think of this as “global wierding” rather than global warming. It means our weather may become more extreme—be it hot or cold, wet or dry. So far, 2010 seems to be the poster child for global wierding, with the extreme winter on the East Coast, followed by a particularly hot summer, with a few floods thrown in across the country. If we humans are generating a malevolent regime of weather as we alter the climate, I guess I’ll take some extra fog over all the other possibilities.

While our coastal fog doesn’t harbor ghostly apparitions, it does bring some interesting visitors to the coast. Our fog is a direct result of cooler water near shore, which usually means our upwelling cycle has stocked local waters with lots of nutrients. Thus the fog is often associated with improved fishing, more squids and small fishes that attract more marine mammals and seabirds. It’s an interesting coincidence that we’re having the coolest, foggiest summer in perhaps 30 years, and we’re having one of the biggest boom years for krill—as well as the largest numbers of blue whales and humpback whales that we’ve seen in three decades. Or perhaps it’s not a coincidence at all.

The fog is also related to some terrestrial phenomena around Monterey Bay. The magnificent redwood trees exist south of San Francisco because of this fog. They’re able to live in small groves, hunkered down where fog is funneled into coastal canyons. The design of their foliage enables the redwoods to condense droplets from the fog and drip this added precipitation around their roots. This provides enough soil moisture to get the trees through an otherwise rainless summer season, and also provides a microclimate for a special community of plants and animals that exist around the feet of these giants.

So I guess I shouldn’t complain about the overcast weather. Our coastal systems—both on the land and in the water—would not be the same without this foggy phenomenon. I’ll just put on a jacket and go whale watching….

—Jim Covel

Photo by Victor Iglesias

Science interpretation is a growing opportunity in the science community. Science education is a more commonly used term, but , in my view that is really more appropriate to formal education. Children or adults learning science at a community school or college are motivated by class credits, degrees, graduation and grades. Science interpretation is more about connecting non-formal audiences at a science center, zoo, natural area, park or research center with the important work of scientists. Some science programs have built into their funding a commitment to sharing those stories with diverse publics. But sometimes there are forgotten audiences.

A regional director for U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) invited me to a conversation about interpretation about eight years ago. He pointed out that the Republican Contract for America that Speaker Gingrich promoted had put the USGS at ZERO in the federal budget. Apparently Congressional leaders did not understand the key role that this agency plays in monitoring water throughout the U.S. along with its long history of map making and other forms of geological and ecological research. He explained that USGS scientists are excellent at communicating their research to the scientific community but may have left out the general public and Congress, forgotten audiences of some importance.

With careful effort USGS leadership did inform Congress of what they do and money for the agency was restored. After all, these are the folks that predict flooding, droughts and all sorts of other natural disasters. Their knowledge helps agriculture, industry, tourism, emergency agencies and communities in diverse ways. He vowed to do more to interpret USGS science to broader audiences including Congress. Indeed, we’ve had several of their staff take the Interpretive Trainer’s Course since that conversation.

Too often we hear media stories about science that make it all sound like a huge waste of money without consideration of the incredible potential that arises from very basic research. Fleming’s penicillin research would likely be reported in a modern newscast as, “wasteful spending to study the blue mold that grows on oranges.” That blue penicillin mold has saved millions of lives since the late 1930’s.

Science needs a public interface with the masses and with decision makers. Global climate change is just one example of an important story from researchers being hijacked by  more sensational stories about “misleading emails.” If we are to plan and react with understanding to our changing climate, the good work of scientists must be better understood by taxpayers and decision makers. Interpretation is a communication approach that is still relatively unknown to many communities of science professionals. And many science programs forget that their funders and taxpaying supporters may not really understand how their thoughtful work in science leads to public benefits.

Science professionals could be trained in interpretive planning and writing. Or science programs could employ interpreters or interpretive planners to connect with their forgotten audiences. Sometimes scientists take on the task themselves with no interpretive planning or writing knowledge and the results can be disappointing. Signs with thousands of jargon-laden text do not make a connection with anyone.

At NAI we do not meet many scientists seeking help with interpretation of their work yet, but we look forward to more opportunities to assist scientists with science interpretation. It will benefit all of us to help everyone understand the important work of scientists.

-Tim Merriman

Photo by Mark M : http://www.sxc.hu/profile/phirefast

There are few things that can blend the unique nature and culture of a region as well as regional cuisine. Food has all the ingredients for good interpretation—it’s multi-sensory, participatory, full of emotional connections as well as intellectual content. If you’re trying to convey a sense of place or heritage in a way that appeals to a diverse audience, try going through their stomachs to reach their hearts and minds.

One of my favorite examples of the food-interpretation connection is the Hawaiian Luau (pictured above) that is often part of the visitor experience in the islands. At an authentic luau, you not only get to eat great food, but you hear the stories behind the food, where it comes from, how it’s prepared, and the cultural context and rituals that accompany serving and consuming certain foods. For example, I was curious why I often saw small fishes, such as squirrel fish or small mullet, for sale at fish auctions or the supermarket. It turns out that the traditional Hawaiian diet was lacking in calcium. So eating small fishes—including the bones—was a way to provide a source of calcium. That practice also is a more sustainable way to eat—harvesting fishes that are lower on the food chain that reproduce and grow more quickly. Thus learning about local diets also means learning about the natural resources of the region, the effects of seasons and weather, and knowing more about the lifestyles of traditional consumers. One soon realizes that the indigenous peoples of each region invented the idea of “eating local” long before it became today’s dining fashion.

I’ve seen a number of interpretive programs that use this approach with great success. In South Africa we feasted on corn meal beer, sadza, mopane worms and dried fish. In the arctic, it was caribou jerky and fried char (I took a pass on the muktuk). In central California the menu includes acorn mush, Manzanita berry ale, perhaps some dried salmon or venison. Now that I think about it—most of my memories of places include the food that is associated with that locale and the indigenous culture.

However I also see that food connection slowly fading in so many places. With a little sleuthing one could usually find a café or restaurant that specialized in “local dishes” or traditional foods. That’s changing as larger market chains and franchise restaurants overtake individual proprietorships and the local flavor (literally) is disappearing from our landscape.

Interpretive settings may be one of the last holdouts where traditional foods are available, with a side dish of interpretation to explain the cultural practices associated with harvesting and preparing the food. In fact, interpretive venues—such as historic farms—may be one of the last places where people can see where their food comes from. Years ago the talented interpreters at East Bay Regional Park District started doing a “super market nature walk” for inner city kids in the San Francisco Bay Area. On these walks the kids were amazed to learn that carrots and potatoes grew in the soil, that milk (and beef) came from cows, or that a huge portion of our diet comes from grass in one form or another (i.e. wheat, corn, rice, etc.). After an hour in the supermarket those kids had a different perspective on the food they ate—and perhaps they made better food choices in the future.

I’m willing to bet that many of us talk about what birds and animals eat, or the foods that pioneers or native tribes lived on, but how often do we connect that to our modern diets? We can help our audiences learn about healthy choices in today’s diet by knowing more about what our ancestors ate in the past—and it can be a tasty lesson in the bargain!

—Jim Covel

The interpretive planning class gets a site visit at West Creek Reservation to better know the site early in the planning process.

Last week in Cleveland our interpretive planning class worked on plans for interpretive media for the grounds of the new park and interpretive project being developed by Cleveland Metroparks (CM) in collaboration with the Northeast Ohio Sewer District and City of Parma. A previous class worked on the overall concept for the Stewardship Center and many of their suggestions have been included in the design of the building. At last week’s class, John Cardwell, CM’s landscape architect, presented on progress being made on the center that is now under development, the WaterShed.

The West Creek watershed is on the Cuyahoga River, which caught on fire thirteen times in the past hundred fifty years and served as a catalyst for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency to toughen standards regarding water pollution through the Clean Water Act and other legislation.

Not only is West Creek on a famously polluted watershed, the specific property of this reserve has an old landfill on it. It is surrounded by industrial sites and some homes who have only recently been moved to city sewage from having septic fields. The stream quality here is currently not so good and it is a great place to pursue their two goals – demonstrate restoration change on the ground and engage local citizens in applying best practices to bring about the positive change.

John began by explaining that they are working with “The Sustainable Sites Initiative™ (SITES™) in design of the grounds and  LEED standards with the building for the WaterShed. Best Management Practices (BMPs) are being encouraged already in the community by doing rain barrel workshops at some CM nature centers. These help homeowners build inexpensive rain barrels to install at home. Rainwater HOGs, large rain barrel systems, are being installed on nature centers as demonstrations. Slowing down water in the watershed is desirable to

Wetlands provide wildlife habitat while serving as a filter for stormwater and residential runoff.

increase the natural filtering of stormwater. Wetlands, in addition to providing wildlife habitat, are key components in this streamshed for slowing down stormwater.

CM’s chief scientist, John Mack, explained that they have 30 years of mainstem streams data collection in Ohio, one of the largest databases of its kind, but little headwater stream monitoring.  Scientific monitoring of the change on the ground is vital to the process. The creative interpretive media being planned will engage local residents in using better practices in their yards that drain into the West Creek watershed.

We have many watersheds in the U.S. where people live close to landfills, mining tailings, and industrial grounds. Improving water quality with citizen participation is a learning process from all directions. Too often we clean up our problems with no citizen awareness that it has been done. Good interpretive planning in this setting will help the community understand their roles and responsibilities in watershed protection, improvement and management.

The reconstructed wetlands on West Creek already attract great blue herons.

The parks department, sewage district and city cooperating on a major stewardship and ecological restoration project is fairly unique and a great opportunity. The sewage department is already offering discounts on sewage bills for those who use BMPs to help improve water quality on West Creek. Careful monitoring of the change in West Creek by scientists will give an important check on the effectiveness of the BMPs and citizen participation. The park will provide recreation space for residents while engaging them in a very worthwhile community project of restoration.

I’m looking forward to going back for a visit in two years when the WaterShed building and grounds at West Creek Reservation are redeveloped and being used by the people of Parma and surrounding areas. I want to see the creative interpretive ideas on the ground and in the hands of local children and families.

A nineteenth century conservationist in Japan, Tanaka Shozo, said, “The care of rivers is not a question of rivers but of the human heart.” Interpretation helps people make the emotional connections with places and stories that lead to commitment. This is a great place to demonstrate the power of such efforts.

- Tim Merriman

There have been many models to predict decision-making behavior through the years. Our modern industry of marketing and advertising is based largely on decision-making models. After all, the goal of most advertising is to persuade you to engage in a particular behavior—namely purchasing a particular product or service. Whether we like to admit it or not, most interpreters are in a similar business. We’re trying to persuade our audience to engage in particular behaviors, such as resource conservation, protecting heritage sites, supporting the organizations that make our work possible. So there may be some merit in keeping up with current thought and practice in the marketing world.

I recently read some work by Dr. James March, Professor Emeritus in Political Science and Business at Stanford University. Dr. March developed a model based on two key dimensions in making decisions; 1) logical consequences of behavior and 2) the propensity for humans to be attracted to behaviors that reinforce our image or identity. Persuading someone to take a particular action in order to avoid dire consequences (threat appeal) can sometimes get short-term results, but seldom changes long-term behavior. Engaging in behavior that is consistent with some aspect of your identity (or who you aspire to be) is a far more attractive proposition, and one that is more likely to be reinforced by intrinsic rewards.

One of the challenges we face in conservation education is getting people to adopt conservation behaviors, and Dr. March’s model may help explain why we aren’t more effective in this endeavor. It seems like so much of the time we’re telling people about the consequences of inaction on environmental issues. If I keep burning fossil fuels, I’m adding to climate change. If I eat rock cod, I’m depleting a valuable fishery. In other words, the messaging around many conservation issues tends to focus on the bad outcomes that will result if we don’t change our ways. That may be true, but it’s not very motivating. If the messages reinforced our affinity for nature and painted a picture of a sustainable future that we could enjoy—we might be more willing to consider long-term changes in our behavior. Focusing on gains is going to be more popular that focusing on losses—so let’s frame things in terms of all the good we have to gain.

Some of the more successful conservation efforts in the past century have been based on a positive vision of the future. The nation’s national parks were initiated as a way to protect wildlife and timber from widespread poaching efforts. However, from the perspective of the American public, this was a program to protect the nation’s unique natural and cultural wonders for all time—and folks got behind it. Ducks Unlimited was founded to set aside wetlands and waterfowl habitat with the vision of maintaining waterfowl populations into the future—and both hunters and birdwatchers happily support the organization.

It’s also helpful to reinforce aspects of your audience’s identity that are consistent with the behavior or decision you want them to adopt. If you’re trying to nurture supporters for your nature center—let’s call it the Norman Marsh Nature Center, how about addressing you’re audience as “friends of the Norman Marsh Nature Center” or “wise students of nature” or some other complimentary term. Sam Ham refers to that technique as labeling, and it’s one of my favorites. Reinforcing desired aspects of identity helps to reinforce decisions that support that identity. So if I see myself as a friend of the nature center, I’m more likely to make choices that support the mission of that institution.

We interpreters tend to be passionate about the resources we’re protecting—we wouldn’t be as effective without that passion. However, that can lead us to using consequence-based arguments to help get our audience to act.  Just remember that using positive emotional connections and appealing to the positive aspects of your audience’s identity is going to inspire long-term commitment to positive choices.

—Jim Covel

Bob Hinkle introduces the planning class to the West Creek Reservation site for the new WaterShed project.

I’m not in the new sitcom, Hot in Cleveland. I’m in Cleveland and it’s not hot this week, temperature-wise. But it is really HOT in our business due to Cleveland Metroparks (CM). Bob Hinkle is the Chief of Outdoor Education and for 39 years he has been a member of NAI and AIN before that, one of our two parent organizations. His leadership in CM’s education and interpretive programs for 28 years has been amazing. Dr. Bob, as many affectionately call him, has encouraged professional development as a cultural norm in this old and revered park district.

This is our fourth interpretive planning course in Cleveland at his request and managers of nature centers and programs in this system are required to earn the Certified Interpretive Manager or Planner credential. CM’s planner, landscape architect and designers have had the planner course, helping them work together with site managers and interpreters, all using a common process and planning vocabulary.

Lisa Brochu explains logic models with an example.

This week’s course is working on the challenge of planning the interpretive elements on the WaterShed grounds that augment the services of the building in achieving site objectives. Participants are from all over the U.S. and Canada along with six staff members of CM, with varying levels of experience in interpretive planning and graphic design. During the course, participants are exposed to planning principles and processes, then apply what they’ve learned to the on-site project challenge.

The culture of professional development and interpretive planning encouraged by Bob Hinkle is important to the success of CM’s six nature centers and other outdoor programs. Large organizations with  policies, politics and bureaucracy can end up with a “can’t do it” emotional environment, but thoughtful training and planning keeps professionals open to personal growth and empowers them with an understanding of what they CAN DO cost effectively and efficiently. CM continues to invest in helping their dedicated professionals grow and become better planners – that’s HOT and is making a difference in Cleveland.

-Tim Merriman