NEW PALESTINE — On a nearly picture-perfect spring afternoon, kids and adults gathered at Sugar Creek Township Park on Monday for a little fresh air and a whole lot of outdoor activity in honor of Earth Day.
Earth Day is an annual event designed to demonstrate support for environmental protection of the earth. Organizers from Dani’s Dreams Outdoor Education Center put the event together for the community and invited area students of all ages to join the celebration.
Dani’s Dreams is named after Dani Griffin, who always had a great love of the outdoors and working with kids. Dani was tragically killed in a car accident in 2006 when she was just 23 years old. Dani’s Dreams Innovation in Education Corporation connects students and teachers to the world around them using media and technology to explore and create innovative student-led multimedia and S.T.E.M. (Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics) projects.
Donna Griffin, Dani’s mother, is the founder of Dani’s Dream and was the hostess for the Earth Day Event. With the help of New Palestine High School’s Earth Club members, who led a scavenger hunt, helped with nature crafts and took part in all kinds of outdoor games with the younger students, a good time was had by all.
“We had over 100 people,” Griffin said. “We all had such a great time, and I feel like this was the first big event we had since COVID where we’ve reached out to the community and they really responded where we did something at the Sugar Creek trail.”
Griffin, who works at Zion Lutheran School noted how Sugar Creek Township is such a great resource for the community, and unfortunately not everyone knows about which is why she was thrilled at such a big turnout for Earth Day.
“We thought we’d have one small group of people and we’d take them through the trails, and it ended up we had groups of 20 all around the park at several places at once,” Griffin said. “Then when the animal show with Hedgehog Hannah started there were so many people who wanted to gather round and see that.”
New Palestine High School (NPHS) Environmental Science teacher Brittany Bennett is the NPHS Earth Club sponsor. Griffin said that Bennett and her high school students helped make the event even more enjoyable.
“They really helped us out a lot,” Griffin said.
In addition to the high school students, there were numerous elementary aged students from Zion Lutheran’s Dani’s Dreams program there who also took part if the event.
We had the kids make presentations, including all the Dani’s Dreams members,” Griffin said. “They made presentations about Earth Day and animals.”
That included a presentation about pollution.
“We coordinated with the Earth Club at New Pal and they had activities along there and they helped with the elementary kids,” Griffin said.
Griffin feels events like Earth Day where student presentations and student activities help children and teens understand they can make a difference on this earth.
“We want kids to understand that they can do things that matter and make a difference in their communities and this world,” Griffin said.
