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Be a Virtual Fan
Written By: Ken Conover - Highlands Biological Foundation Trustee | Issue: 2020/06 - June
This season at the Highlands Biological Station has been unusual to say the least.
This is the time when our campus comes alive with Botanical Garden blooms, visitors, researchers, and Nature Center campers from all over. This year, however, it’s been quiet. We spent the winter and early spring planning our annual nature camps, courses, events, and lectures for the Highlands community to enjoy this summer, but we were cut short due to the COVID-19 pandemic that led to many canceled plans.
Like you, we struggled to foresee if our typical summer plans would come to fruition.
Taking things day by day, we came to realize that this summer would not be like most. In accordance to Western Carolina University’s policies and with the safety of our community being our priority, we closed our offices, canceled events and June nature camps, and had to get creative and find new ways to serve our mission to educate our community about the natural world around us.
This spring, the Highlands Biological Foundation instituted a new Virtual Learning Center for the Nature Center and Botanical Garden on our website (highlandsbiological.org) as well as provided environmental content and natural history resources through the Nature Center and HBS Facebook pages (@HighlandsNatureCenter & @highlandsbiologicalstation).
These efforts continue on our social media and include our daily ‘Nearby Nature’ series, live streamed Botanical Garden tours with HBF Education Specialist, Paige Engelbrektsson, virtual Botanical Garden yoga sessions with Rachel Kinback of Yoga Highlands, and ‘HBS Science Short Shows’ with HBS Education Outreach Coordinator Patrick Brannon. These programs are suitable for all ages!
For our adult members, we have our “Weekend Wanders” series that features book, film, and podcast recommendations from our HBF trustees and staff to help you bring the outdoors inside. We hope you will take advantage of our virtual offerings and connect with us during these unusual times this summer!
For more information about our virtual offerings or other programming at HBS, visit our website highlandsbiological.org or call us at (828) 526-2221.
