Port Gamble S'klallam Foundation

Heronswood garden: the Foundation supports the maintenance and enhancement of heronswood garden, a 15-acre botanical garden that collects, propagates, and preserves plant species. Heronswood collaborates with academic organizations and public gardens and provides a wide variety of educational and environmental experiences for community, visitors, and tribal and garden members while also striving to enhance the public's awareness of the role and culture of the Port Gamble S'klallam tribe. Heronswood's display gardens have been featured internationally as an example of creative, environmentally sensitive, and botanically impressive plantsmanship and garden design. Garden development is guided by the vision and under the guidance of an independent steering committee, a comprehensive master plan, and a skilled, trained, and experienced management staff. In 2020, the garden received generous support from the Port Gamble S'klallam tribe, private foundations, members, and donors to address the health threatsof covid pandemic. A new double-wide manufactured home was installed to provide segregated administrative workspaces and restrooms for garden staff, a guest services ticketing window that allows safer distancing between staff and visitors, and enlarged access and waiting areas. A broadcast system was established in the garden to enhance distancing for guided tours; outdoor hard scaped areas were created to provide staff and visitors with open air meeting and classroom spaces, communications were maintained digitally, and many lectures, classes, and meetings went live online. In 2022, the Foundation committed to a conservative approach for fiscal management and expenditures, focusing on necessary infrastructure repair and supports for heronswood garden (some of it postponed for 2 years due to covid pandemic) while strategically investing in programs and services that also increased capacity for future revenue generation. Grants from public and private sources were secured for projects anticipated to (1) expand cultural programming and activity options for the Port Gamble S'klallam tribe, (2) grow capacity for public events, 3) increase the number of garden convening areas to expand options for facility use and space rental.

Native american student middle school environmental enrichment program:a project of the Port Gamble S'klallam career enrichment and education department, this program provides environmental education within a culture-based context. Previous activities under this program have included student classroom and field research into traditional plantsand their uses, and both indoor and outdoor concepts of environmental stewardship in both academic disciplines and tribal cultural traditions, practices, and beliefs. Additional training revolved around the stem-based skills necessary to build and operate a traditionalcoast salish style canoe with tribal elder instructors. The program, funded by the russell family Foundation, presents stem education through the combination of tribal elder knowledge and participation and modern environmental science. Students show more interest in stem fields and typically test at or above their grade level in math, reading, and science, while concurrently becoming better stewards of the land and preparing more effectively for high school and post-secondary education. The program's response to the covid public health crisis in 2020 was mitigated by technology, outdoor and computer classroom access, and small, distanced group activities.