I love everything about this trip.  It was truly a wonderful experience.   This experience renewed my sense of urgency to educate people about nature and conservations.  Hog Island Educator’s week is well organized, packed with learning opportunities.  It was a calm, supportive learning environment that engages and motivates educators of all subject background.  I love all of the hands on experience from digging into intertidal zone, seeing luna moth and puffins for the first time, bog walk (I was very prepared and only got 5 mosquito bites!), learned how to carve my own stamp from Master Sherrie.  I had the opportunity to meet with so many incredible and inspiring guest speakers and listening to their stories and their experience was amazing.

I am a volunteer educator at an elementary school for the past five years.  My goal is to educate and to inspire our school community the importance of nature and creating projects that support for successful stewardship and sustainability.  The programs were very successful and received many awards, positive feedbacks from our school district and attentions from local newspapers.  Although, there are workshops, professional developments, grants available to teachers for further study environmental related topics, a teacher certification is required.   I always wish I have a teacher certification so that I can take all of the workshops that other institutes are offering to educators.  I was extremely thrilled to find out Hog Island is offering educator week course to both formal and informal educator so I thought I should give it a try.  I was even more thrilled when I found out I got accepted to Hog’s Island Educator’s Week with minority scholarship!  You can ask our principal and assistant principal, we were all jumping for joy in her office with my acceptance email! 

I remember one evening sessions called “Fish Bowl”.  Although I am not a licensed educator, I do consider myself as an educator.  I was looking around the room; everyone in the room is either a teacher/working for an environmental institute or studying this field.  I was thinking how lucky I am to have opportunity to be here.  And then I look around again, I noticed I am the only Asian attending this camp.  I am very happy and proud to represent as an informal educator who spent time to make changes to my community and as well as representing the Asian community who will bring environmental awareness to our community.   Without this scholarship, I wouldn’t be able to qualify or afford to pay for this camp.  I am so grateful and want to thank Hog Island for giving me this incredible opportunity that I never thought I can experience.  I hope this scholarship will continue to bring diversity into Hog Island’s educator’s week in the future. 

Wing Kong recieved a National Aduubon Society Diversity Scholarship to attend Educator's Week. Applications are now open for 2020 here.