It’s just been announced that the Bigfork High School Cave Club was awarded the President’s Environmental Youth Award! The award focused on the member’s development of eBat and eCave sites, which allows people without access to GIS to contribute the club’s cave monitoring data, but the award also recognizes the club’s many years of work to help conserve and protect cave bats and other cave resources. Ryan Cantrell was the prime mover in getting the club recognized. He, Colten Wroble and Scout Jessop created the eBat website. See the example here: http://ebatsmt.com/
“The President’s Environmental Youth Award (PEYA) recognizes outstanding environmental projects by K-12 youth. The PEYA program promotes awareness of our nation’s natural resources and encourages positive community involvement. Since 1971, the President of the United States has joined with EPA to recognize young people for protecting our nation’s air, water, land, and ecology. It is one of the most important ways EPA and the Administration demonstrate commitment to environmental stewardship efforts created and conducted by our nation’s youth.”
Here is a link to EPA’s press release for the club’s PEYA award: https://www.epa.gov/newsreleases/bigfork-high-school-students-mont-recognized-presidents-environmental-youth-award