CALIFORNIA ENVIROTHON

BUMPS IN THE ROAD!

Bumps in the road, YES! During the last couple of years, your California Envirothon Steering Committee has hit some bumps in the road! Along with nationwide decrease in funding for conservation education non-profit programs, the Covid pandemic, and the shortage of active members who were free to do logistics planning for an annual event were major reasons for our slowdown! As a result, last September, your CA Envirothon Steering Committee felt obligated to dissolve its non-profit status and to seek other avenues of support.

Nevertheless, there has been a small group of Envirothon cohorts dedicated to keeping CA Envirothon ALIVE and GOING! The group has moved forward with a competition as best we could for 2025 when teachers familiar with Envirothon contacted us with enthusiasm to move ahead with team development late last fall. Thus, a committee was developed to moved ahead on logistics.

The result is that eight diverse teams from southern California competed at the Riverside Corona Resource Conservation District on. April 12, 2025. Their spirit and eagerness carried each team through the five field-station written tests and a twenty-minute oral test, based on the national theme, “Roots and Resiliency: Fostering Forest Stewardship in a Canopy of Change. The top-three scores competed orally once again to determine which team would travel to Calgary, Alberta in July to compete at the NCF International Envirothon competition!

We are proud to announce that Granada Hills Charter High School’s team was the First-Place team for 2025 as assessed by our four resource professional judges. The Second-Place team was Portola High School in Irvine. The Third-Place team was Palisades High School in Pacific Palisades.

Look to our website for further continuing news and information! Note that our website address has changed slightly. Our old website will redirect you to www.caenvirothon.org

Watch us grow! Envirothon is an exciting and effective high school youth program that can lead to a great variety of conservation science and career pathways!

NCF-CA Envirothon proudly announces the 2025 Envirothon winning team from Granada Hills Charter School. We wish them success as the advance to compete in the NCF-Envirothon in Calagary, Alberta, Canada in July.

California’s Envirothon winning team, the Bladderpod Squad of Palisades Charter High School, won 10th overall at the 2024 NCF-Envirothon! The competition was held at the Hobart and William Smith Colleges in Geneva, New York, on July 28 – August 3, 2024.

Team members include Olivia La Vie, Shawna Ashley, Carter Yean, Jaden Rahmani and Jesse Rosen. Steve Engelmann is their teacher and advisor.

California Envirothon congratulates this successful team and wish them all the very best in their future endeavors! Our gratitude goes out to Steve Engelmann for a job well done. You’ve once again made California proud!

Carter Yean: “Envirothon was such a great experience to not only meet experts in the field, but other passionate kids from around the world.”

Jaden Rahmani: “Even for those who might not be focused on saving the world, Envirothon is still an amazing gateway to developing skills that apply to many career fields, including those outside of environmental science, and to meeting people with a broad range of perspectives. You get to learn things that are just not covered in a classroom, all while enjoying the serenity of nature in places you have never been before.”

“Envirothon was such a huge part of my high school experience, and I made some of my closest friends through it. It is not an opportunity you want to miss out on.”

Olivia La Via: “I had an amazing experience with Envirothon. It was a great way to meet people my age who are interested in protecting our future, and I made friends from all over the U.S. that I would never have met otherwise. It was also a great opportunity to talk to people with careers in the subjects I’m interested in, and I got a hands-on experience unlike any other.”

Jesse Rosen: “I would say that Envirothon has not only helped me find my passion for inciting change to come about for the betterment of our planet, but it has allowed me to travel to and see beautiful places that I otherwise would not have gotten the opportunity to go to, and therefore learn about those environments beyond California. Of course, meeting other students from around the world who are also passionate about helping our Earth has been an incredible experience, and meeting tons of professionals along the way has allowed me to grasp further an idea of what I want to do with my own education and career goals. Envirothon is an outstanding program for high school students, giving us incredible learning and growing opportunities, and I think expanding the CA competition would be an amazing thing.”

CA Envirothon 2019

About Us

The California Envirothon is a natural resources and environmental competition for teams of high school students (grades 9-12) and youth organizations such as 4-H clubs.

Youth (ages 14-19) are provided resources to study the key areas of soils, wildlife, forestry, aquatic ecosystems, and the annual current study topic (e.g., climate change).

The teams are tested on their comprehension, critical thinking, and understanding of natural resources conservation, stewardship, and environmental protection.

CAE also extends its scope to include Native and Indigenous peoples and the close relationships with their culture and traditions to the environment. CAE offers youth the opportunity to learn the skills and tools necessary to create a path to success: collaborative team work, public speaking, and the willingness to learn new ideas.

For information, or if you are interested in being added to our contact list, please email us.
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