High School Fairfax Master Naturalist Makes a Big Impact at Hidden Oaks …and volunteering makes a big impact on her
Photo: By Kristina Watts, Juliet Phillips building the scarecrow hut
Photos and Article by Kristina Watts, Hidden Oaks Nature Center Site Manager (and FMN)
During the last two weeks of summer vacation, Juliet Phillips has spent her mornings helping kids with nature crafts, supervising science experiments, playing instructional games on the nature trail, and reading stories out loud at snack time. After camp, she checks in to see if there is any other work that can be done to finish up the projects she’s working on here at Hidden Oaks. I’d say this is a typical volunteer day, but the truth is there is no “typical” day for her, given the variety of activities she’s involved in.
Photo: By Kristina Watts, Juliet Phillips presenting the snake enrichment board she constructed to Hidden Treasures Pirate Camp (with Jackie the eastern rat snake).
Juliet is a senior at Thomas Jefferson High School. She became a Fairfax Master Naturalist during the spring of her sophomore year. She remembers taking the Basic Training class during track season – she busily rushed from school to practice to class each week. She became a Fairfax Master Naturalist because she was looking for ways to broaden her knowledge about nature in the local area, and to ways to volunteer. Her mother heard about the Basic Training class from a friend who is an FMN, and upon researching the program, Juliet realized that it was perfect for her.
Juliet started volunteering at Hidden Oaks Nature Center soon after joining FMN. She was happy to find opportunities here because of our flexible hours (weekends are a must for a busy student) and volunteer activities specifically for teens. She started with our teen stewardship projects and habitat management (invasive species removal) workdays, and now also has a bi-weekly animal care shift. She also helps out at interpretive/educational programs. Because of her hardworking attitude and overall capability, she has become an important part of our HONC team.
Photo: By Kristina Watts, Juliet Phillips building the scarecrow hut
She first exhibited her detail-orientedness and ability to work independently when asked to install bird strike decals during a teen workday. Her leadership ability was solidly demonstrated on another teen workday when our task was to rebuild the scarecrow hut (a representation of a Native American structure). She creatively took on the engineering design and gently directed the other volunteers. She used her Eagle Scout training to teach the others how to do rope lashings to hold the structure together. The hut – which usually needs to be rebuilt annually – is holding up remarkably well and has been used in dozens of field trip demonstrations.
This summer, in addition to her animal care shifts and a few weeks as a volunteer camp assistant, she has enthusiastically volunteered to take on some individual tasks to improve visitor experience here at Hidden Oaks. She designed and built a snake exercise board to provide our Animal Ambassador snakes with enrichment and a place to demonstrate their climbing skills during programs. She’s currently working on constructing a bamboo xylophone/chime structure for Nature Playce, to add a musical element to the natural play area. Again, putting her scouting skills to use, a future activity is helping us organize a volunteer opportunity for scouts to tie together the Nature Playce fence splits and posts to stabilize the fence and prevent guests from moving the stacked pieces.
Photo: By Kristina Watts, Juliet Phillips helping to protect oak saplings from deer browse
Over the past year, Juliet has been figuring out where she wants to go to college and what she wants to study. She knew she wanted to pursue a degree in the environmental science realm, but it was difficult to parse out the differences between the natural world-related programs (e.g., environmental science, environmental studies, conservation biology, forestry, etc.). The training she’s received as an FMN has been helpful in that
she’s been able to explore various aspects of environmental science, and to get a foundation in all of them. Volunteering at HONC has helped her realize what she likes and what she doesn’t want to do long-term. As of now, her path is leading her toward a major in wildlife biology.
Juliet’s favorite part of volunteering is being able to say she’s made a positive impact on her community at the end of the day. We at HONC are appreciative for all of the contributions from all of our volunteers, and are proud and grateful for the accomplishments that Juliet has made here at the park. If there are any other youth in your life that have a passion for nature, look for volunteer opportunities at Hidden Oaks or any of the other Fairfax nature centers.
