The Virginia Project Learning
Tree Outstanding Educator Award was presented to Brita
Hampton from Star of the Sea Regional Catholic School during
the 2008 VFA Annual Convention in April.
Currently a science teacher for 6th, 7th, and 8th graders,
Hampton also serves as the Science Coordinator for her
school. She has been involved with Project Learning Tree (PLT)
since 2004, when she attended a PLT Energy & Society
workshop at the Virginia Middle School Association
Conference. She was very excited about PLT’s teaching
materials, and planned a PLT workshop for 24 teachers in her
local Catholic schools.
Left
to right, Lisa Deaton, Virginia PLT
coordinator, presented the PLT
Outstanding Educator Award to Brita Hampton. |
In 2005, Brita teamed with
Al Stenstrup from the national Project Learning Tree office
to plan a student presentation at the International PLT
Coordinators’ Conference in Virginia Beach that year. During
the conference, Star of the Sea students shared several PLT
activities as part of this general session. Brita helped all
of the teachers at Star of the Sea School select appropriate
activities, and coached the teachers and students. The
entire school, kindergarten through eighth grade,
participated in a variety of PLT activities, and 31 students
presented their work at the conference. Afterward, Hampton
wrote an article describing her experience for Momentum, the
journal of the National Catholic Educational Association
titled, “Opportunities Don’t Come Knocking Every Day…You
Must Go Out and Find Them.”
In 2006, Brita attended Holiday Lake Forestry Camp and
immediately implemented those PLT activities with her Summer
Science Program students. They learned the parts of trees,
how to identify trees, and how to make paper.
In 2007, when the North American Association for
Environmental Education Convention came to Virginia Beach,
Brita’s school supplied 200 pieces of artwork that
represented seven different PLT activities for a large
display in the main hallway of the Virginia Beach Convention
Center. Brita also brought several students to the Author’s
Corner event, where they taught conference participants how
to make paper.
Last year, Hampton volunteered to be interviewed for a PBS
series for middle school students called “The Forest Files.”
Her episode dealt with why forestry and urban forestry
should be important to middle school students. Brita talked
about the water cycle and erosion, runoff and development
concerns, and how middle school students can impact the
forest in both positive and negative ways.
Hampton is a dedicated conservationist. For example, she
reuses paper in her classroom—her students know to make sure
that they are using the correct side of the sheet! She also
seeks out leadership opportunities for her students, and her
work centers on helping them to be active, educated
citizens, who will follow her lead as stewards of the
environment.
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