BIO

My school years were set in Lynden, Washington between the Cascades and Puget Sound. High school was exciting for me but I especially enjoyed hiking and climbing in the Cascades. I attended Calvin College in Grand Rapids, Michigan and received my Masters Degree from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia. After student teaching at a high school near Calvin College, the principal invited me to join the school as a fulltime biology teacher. It was a great choice for me and I stayed for eleven years until the call of the West lured me back to my hometown community again. Northwest Washington has been my teaching home for the past thirty three years and its geology and biology has become my classroom.

For the past thirty three summers, I have worked as a park ranger/interpreter in Yellowstone National Park. That experience has been a stimulating bridge between science research and the teaching craft. I have had many exciting experiences with grizzly bears and other animals and have especially enjoyed doing photography work both for the park and for my own audiovisual programs. Other hobbies are rebuilding antique player pianos, restoring old cars, and mountain climbing.

Teaching has been my love for forty four years and I can't image a more fulfilling career. What a challenge to stimulate a life long love of learning and to develop the concept of stewardship of planet earth!

PARTNER STATEMENT

Harlan Kredit has a passion for the environment coupled with a goal to establish an ethic of environmental stewardship based on solid science. He is an outstanding environmental science educator because he believes that teaching and learning in an environmental context enables students to gain an appreciation of the complex interactions that occur in nature. He designs instructional activities based on good science and motivates kids through real-world projects. His ongoing key community connections focused on salmon restoration, which included the planting of more than 18,000 trees and shrubs. He believes this is science education at its best because students are engaged in meaningful ways as they debate the evidence for their conclusions. Kredit teaches with enthusiasm, causing learning to be contagious, and his students become enthused as well. During the past three decades, he and his students have developed a strong presence for environmental education in their community and among his colleagues.