This year's National Conservation Foundation (NCF) Envirothon wrapped up last week in Springfield, Missouri. The annual national event is the largest high school natural resource education competition in North America. A total of 52 teams from across North America participated in this penultimate contest to determine the 2015 Envirothon winners.
This year's winning team is from Pembroke High School in Kansas City, Missouri. The team, pictured above, is made up of Francesco DiMare, Domenico DiMare, Deven Dietrich, Saurabh Goel, and Eric Koch (left to right). The second and third place teams were Penncrest High School from Pennsylvania and the Academy of Science & Technology from Texas, respectively. Check out the Envirothon website for the entire list of this year's winners.
The top three teams at this year's Envirothon received cash awards courtesy of Smithfield Foods. This event and the individual state-level events was a collaborative effort of the NCD, Smithfield Foods, local conservation districts, forestry association, educators and cooperating natural resource agencies. More than 4,000 high schools competed in Envirothon events throughout the 2015 season.
The 2016 Envirothon event will be hosted by Forests Ontario in Ontario, Canada July 24-29. Visit their website for more information.
A huge thank you to Missouri for hosting this year's event and to the more than 150 volunteers who helped make the 2015 Envirothon such a huge success.