Home >
LIFE - Lamoille Institute for Educators
LIFE 2008 will be August 4-8 (Monday-Friday), with a likely theme of Forests & Fire. As the institute is planned, more details will be available here.
If you are interested in the institute, please see the general information below, and the 2007 page, and then check back for 2008.
Archive: 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004
General Information
This general information applies to every year of the Lamoille Canyon Institute for Educators. For current year information, see the link above.
Refund | Teams | Projects | Credit | Attendance | Mini-Grants | Ongoing Support | Camp Lamoille | Meals | Lodging | Health & Safety | Emergency & Phones | Equipment List | Resources | Map | Weather
Refund
Registration fees may be refunded, under certain circumstances:
- During the early registration period (ending about eight weeks before the institute): full fees refunded, minus $10 processing fee
- During the regular registration period (ending about two weeks befoe the institute): 50% of fees refunded, minus $10 processing fee
- During the registration blackout period (ending the day before the institute starts): refund only for major medical reasons, minus $10 processing fee
- During and after the institute: no refund for any reason
To cancel your registration, contact registrar Dan Allison, 775-882-2375/775-997-4937, director@nnrec.org.
Membership dues will not be refunded
Teams
Participation by teams from schools is strongly encouraged because both research and experience indicate that learning from the workshop is more likely to be implemented if there is a support network of people who have had the same experience and are highly committed to implementation and change. The team may include teachers, other instructional staff and administrators, and nonformal educators from community partners. Partners might include people from the organizations, agencies or businesses that provide resources or instruction to your school for projects in the classroom, on the schoolyard, and on field trips.
Team payment and discounts are available only during the early registration period. During the regular and on-site registation periods, only individuals may register.
Projects
Working by yourself or with a team, you'll come up with a project for water and wetlands education that can be implemented where you work, in school or in nonformal education settings. If you are lucky enough to be attending with a team of teachers and nonformal partners, this will be your group, but otherwise you may have found some compatible people during the week. You will have some instructional time to develop your project, with support from staff, and will make a brief presentation of your project idea to the whole group. You are not required to complete the project, but of course we hope that you will, and that you'll share your project design, successes, challenges, and future plans with the rest of the group.
Credit
Participants may receive either:
- For teachers only, two inservice credits for 30 hours of instructional time, from the Nevada Department of Education, for no cost; OR
- For teachers and educators, two university credits for 30 hours of instructional time. There may be a three credit option for additional post-institute work. The source and cost of the university credits will vary from year to year, so check each year's page for details (link at the top of this page).
For previous LIFE participants, the program has changed significantly and you may again receive credit. With the current three-year rotation of topics, which started in 2007, you may receive credit once for each topic.
Applicants for inservice credit do not need to take any action ahead of time, and will complete an attendance form with their social security number and district or school, at the end of the institute.
Attendance
All participants will be expected to attend all instructional sessions, whether they are receiving credit or not. We expect you to arrive on time, be prepared for the session with appropriate clothing, gear, learning materials and notebook, participate fully in the session, and stay until the end of the session. Persons who do not attend all sessions for any reason other than illness will be asked to leave the workshop, without credit or refund. The start and end times of the instructional week, as well as start and end times of each session, vary with the year, so please carefully check the schedule page for the current year (link at the top of this page).
Mini-Grants
Mini-grants are available for individuals (up to $500, but more often about $250) and teams (up to $1000, but more often about $500) to implement projects designed during the institute. The total amount available will vary from year to year, and the amount, application deadline, and award date are shown on each year's page (link at the top of this page).
See the Conservation Education Mini-Grant Program for more information about the overall program, including an application form.
Ongoing Support
To the degree possible within organizational capacity and funding, NNREC will continue to provide support to the individuals and teams which attend and have become members of NNREC, by providing materials on loan, email and phone support, connections to other resources, additional professional development, and possibly site visits. An email discussion list will be created for all participants so that they may provide support to each other as well.
Camp Lamoille
Lion's Camp Lamoille in Lamoille Canyon is a rustic organizational camp at about 7000 feet. People who live at lower elevations can expect that it will take some time to adjust, with possible headaches that are best treated by drinking plenty of water and being patient. If you can arrive early and get some light physical exercise, that will help.
The camp is not lighted at night, so you'll want a headlamp (preferred) or flashlight, and spare batteries. Electricity is from a generator which is turned off from 10:30 PM to 6:00 AM.
The lodge/dining hall will be used as our classroom at times, but many of our classes will be outside. Come prepared for a variety of weather including very warm days, very cold nights, thunderstorms, and whatever else the mountains can provide.
Meals
Meals are provided as part of your registration fee. Breakfast will be hearty to keep you going for the day, but there will be light fare for those who wake up late. Lunches will be simple, and some may be field lunches individually prepared at breakfast. Dinners will be hearty. Every meal will have vegetarian options, and most of the meals will have meat options, but the menu will be light on meat.
Tea and coffee will be available from 6:30 AM to 10:00 PM. If you find yourself needing snacks between meals, please bring your own. Leftovers will be available for snacks, but you can't depend on that! If you have special dietary needs, you may bring your own food as a supplement, store it in the kitchen and walk-in refrigerator, and prepare it in the kitchen.
Wednesday dinner is not provided and there is no instruction Wednesday evening, so participants are free at 4:30 PM for the rest of the day. People may want to organize a dinner at the Pine Lodge Dinner House or O'Carroll's Bar and Grill in the town of Lamoille, or at Basque restaurants in Elko (Star Hotel, Nevada Dinner House, and Bil-Toki). None of these options is particularly vegetarian friendly! There are also a few regular restaurants in Spring Creek and many in Elko.
Friday morning breakfast will be light, and whatever leftover lunch items we have will be available for a make-and-take lunch.
About one week before the institute, a menu will be posted on the current year's page (link at the top of this page).
Lodging
The A-frame cabins are without beds, so participants will bring cots or inflatable mattresses, and bedding or sleeping bags. Some cabins are also without electric light. About five people will share a cabin. A shower building close to the cabins has hot running water and electricity. People are also welcome to bring tents for camping or bring a camping trailer or small RV (no hookup or dump is available). Large RVs are not able to negotiate the narrow unpaved entrance road.
People may stay at the Forest Service campground further up Lamoille Canyon, or in the town of Lamoille (three rooms at Hotel Lamoille), or Elko (a wide variety including some historical hotels), but you will not likely be happy trying to get to meals and sessions on time. Remember the attendance requirements! There is no lodging in Spring Creek. No reduction in the registration fee is made for people staying elsewhere.
Health & Safety
Every participant and facilitator must complete the Health Inventory. If you have specific health concerns or disabilities which might affect your participation in the program, please let us know ahead of time so that we can make accomodations if possible. Neither the camp nor the field areas are wheelchair accessible, but acccomodations are possible for people with mobility limitations.
The elevation of the camp is 7000 feet (2200 m), the end of the road is 8800 feet (2700 m), and if you take the optional Friday afternoon hike, you may go to 10,450 feet (3180 m). These high elevations may well produce lethargy, headaches and stomachaches. You can best acclimate by drinking plenty of fluids (but not alcohol!), and by arriving as early as possible and taking leisurely walks at elevation. Make sure that you have at least one quart of water capacity (more is better) and that you drink frequently.
During the workshop, you will be walking on primitive trails, and for short distances off trail on rough ground. Except for the optional hike, we do not cover significant distances, but you do need to be prepared physically and with appropriate footwear for walking and hiking.
Emergency Contact and Phones
There is no cell phone service at Camp Lamoille, nor in most of Lamoille Canyon except for the mouth. The nearest pay phone is in Spring Creek, and Lamoille no longer has a pay phone. Those who cannot forgo phone contact for four days will have to drive down canyon to use cell phones or to the town of Lamoille during break times.
For emergency contact with participants, facilitators, or coordinators, call 775-997-4937. Messages will be checked at least once per day.
Resources
Ruby Mountains Natural History Links
Lamoille, Nevada
- Lamoille (The Complete Nevada Traveler)
- Lamoille (NevadAdventures)
- Pine Lodge Dinner House, 775-753-6363
- O'Carroll's Bar and Grill, 775-753-6451
- Lone Cedar Station General Store and Gift Shop, 775-738-2355
- Lamoille Community Presbyterian Church
Map & Directions
Lion's Camp Lamoille is on the map as Camp Lamoille
Since the camp has no address, you cannot use Mapquest or other such services to get a map to the camp. You can create a map and directions from Elko to the town of Lamoille, however, each service has a different route and several of them do not make sense. The best simple directions are: from Interstate 80, take exit 301 Hwy 225/Mountain City Highway and head south; turn left (east) on Hwy 535/Business 80 (Idaho St) toward downtown; turn right (south) on Hwy 227/5th St/Lamoille Highway; continue across the railroad tracks and southeast out of town through Spring Valley (a scattered town with no center) about 20 miles to the town of Lamoille [there are shortcuts to get here, but staying on Hwy 227 will get you here; do NOT turn on Lower Lamoille Rd]; now that you know where the town of Lamoille is, backtrack about one-half mile and turn left (southeast) on Lamoille Canyon Road and go about six miles; turn right on a dirt road that is upcanyon of the picnic area at the mouth and downcanyon of the campground at mid-canyon - there is a small brown sign for Lions Camp but it can easily be missed; continue about 1/2 mile on the dirt road to the gate and into the camp. These directions have not been field checked. Almost everyone in Elko, Spring Valley and certainly Lamoille will be able to give you directions to Lamoille Canyon, but the camp itself is relatively unknown. Locals often call it the Boy Scout Camp, though it has not been that in years.
Weather
Caution: This weather sticker is observed at Elko. Elko is at about 5000 feet (1550 m), and much less likely to be getting thunderstorms and other mountain weather than the camp at 7000 feet (2200 m). The end of the road in Lamoille Canyon, where we will offer an optional hike, is at about 8800 feet (2700 m).
