Spring Meeting April 12

The spring meeting of the Neshoba County Forestry Association will be held at the Neshoba County Coliseum, beginning at 6:00 p.m., Tuesday, April 12. We have two program possibilities: We hope to have a speaker from the new Mississippi Children's Museum. This project of the Jr. League of Jackson, is one of the premier children's museum in the nations, and is already a huge hit. My grandchildren visited during spring break. The museum was alive with children, all of whom were having a blast. The Mississippi Forestry Association is a sponsor. We committed $250,000 and only lack $29,000 paying our commitment. We have a major exhibit at the museum. It is a mock up of a tree farm being harvested. Children can "cut" foam rubber trees with a toy chain saw, then climb aboard a loader and turn cranks and move levers to lift the log with a grapnel and deposit it on a log deck. "Static" parts of the exhibit show how forests grow and tell all about different forest types and trees that grow in Mississippi. The museum is filled with similar exhibits all about Mississippi, the people who live there, and the work they do. The people from the Children's Museum have a very tight speaking schedule, and there is some doubt that they can make our meeting. As an alternative, I have asked Butch Bailey, MSU Forestry Extension, to present a program on the MFA- sponsored Teachers Conservation Workshops. For 48 years, the MFA has been sponsoring these week-long teachers' camps. We now hold two each summer -- one at Northeast Mississippi Community College at Booneville and another at Jones County Jr. College in Ellisville. I have been on the staff at these workshops for about 20 years, and Butch has been on the staff of the south workshop for many years. Teachers visit forest industries, a tree farm, tree nursery, logging sites, learn about soil and water quality and how loggers work to protect these resources. They learn about timber cruising, and form teams of "timber buyers" and cruise a small block of timber and submit competitive bids for a mock timber sale. A complete Project Learning Tree Workshop is part of the week's agenda. Teachers can earn five Continuing Education Units (CEU's) or three hours college credit by attending this workshop. Five CEU's is enough for a teacher with a Master's Degree to renew his/her teaching license for five years, so this is a BIG deal. Several teachers from this area have attended. Teachers can attend a TCW only once each five years. A local teacher attended five years ago and applied to attend again this coming summer. The NCFA board voted to sponsor him. The MFA pioneered teacher workshops. Other states followed Mississippi's lead, and these workshops are now help all over the nation. Butch Bailey takes photos of teachers in action and presents a very humorous "The Week That Was" wrap-up program at the conclusion of each workshop. Butch has many excellent photos and will use these to present an informative and entertaining program if he is our speaker.