We are a small school with just three teachers and about fifteen 7th and 8th grade students, aged 12-14 years old.

Our school is located on the top floor of a large church building. We have Internet access and hope to communicate with students from other countries to see what kinds of outdoor activities they do. Maybe we can exchange information on how our communities deal with issues like overcrowding, water shortages, and air poluution - as well as more positive topics like community parks, recycling programs and more.

Some students attend school on Saturdays – that’s when we go on our hikes with our teachers and volunteers from a group called “Inner City Outings”. This is a group that takes people, who live in cities on nature outings.

We’re lucky for several reasons. First, Santa Ana is located about 10 kilometers from the ocean, about 20 kilometers from some nice mountain trails, and about 8-15 kilometers from many other nature trails. Little by little we are exploring all these great nature spots that are so easy to reach for us. An added benefit is that the weather is usually very pleasant so we can hike year-round.

As you’ll see after you read our accounts of our hikes, we can see lizards, spiders, beetles, deer, coyotes and other wildlife – all surprisingly close to our city.

We’ll keep you posted as we gather more information about our area. Outdoor education is a great way to learn!.

For more information on Santa Ana, you can go to this Website:

http://www.ci.santa-ana.ca.us/

To share in the converstation visit the YouthCaN project forum at http://www.iearn.org

Or e-mail YouthCaN at youthcan@us.iearn.org.

August 16, 2003

September 13, 2003

September 27, 2003

More on the way!