The Hitchcock Center, founded in 1962, connects people with nature and encourages a deeper emotional bond with the natural world that sustains us all. The Center helps develop a community that understands connections among human health, ecosystems and economies through educational programs that offer a particular focus on children, who live in a world of environmental challenges.
Our Nature Play Afterschool program is designed to give children extended periods of unstructured play outdoors. Research has shown that unstructured play has enormous benefits for children’s wellbeing, imaginations, emotional health and self esteem. Afterschool Work Study students must have a playful spirit, be mindful of safety, and have a lot of energy. Please know that we spend most of the time outdoors, regardless of weather.
845 West Street, Amherst, MA 01002, US
The Hitchcock Center’s mission is to foster a greater awareness and understanding of our environment and to develop environmentally literate citizens.
Hitchcock Center programs are designed to use the study of science and nature, its models, systems, processes, and elements, as a means to provide creative inspiration to solve human problems sustainably. Our programs serve to develop a continuum of competencies that begin at the earliest, most formative years and progress through a process of lifelong learning to engender a greater understanding of the interdependence of the environment, economy, and social issues.
Our approach to education uses the environment as classroom and defines place at a variety of scales - the schoolyard, the backyard, the neighborhood, the park, the farm, the town, the forest, the pond, the mountains, and the watershed. In these settings, the Hitchcock Center helps thousands of children and adults see and understand the impacts of our actions. Through our programs, we make connections to where our food comes from and where our waste goes. We help people understand our intimate relationship with the critical life-sustaining processes that support us.
845 West StreetAmherst, MA 01002
September 20, 2024
