Hello! My name is Jenn and I recently began working as a Youth Engagement Consultant with the National Parks of Boston through Hispanic Access Foundation. I began in March and hit the ground running with helping facilitate a school program on my first day - which is where this image comes from (photo courtesy of Matt Teuten Photography). 

As a prior elementary teacher, I really enjoyed getting to start off working directly with Boston Public School students. The first series of field trips I got to help facilitate and help create was called the SWON Lesson (Shipbuilding Women of the Navy). It was a lot of work to learn the history and discover the individual stories of women who were working here in the Charlestown Navy Yard during WWII. The students absolutely loved the lesson and the ability to participate in mock STEM activities to help simulate the jobs women were doing to help build ships and support the war efforts. There were tables spread around the room that held activities to emulate the different shops of the yard such as the pipe shop, riveting structural shop, paint shop, electric shop, and the ropewalk. Seeing students so engaged was really great and they definitely took away a lot from the field trip. 

We’re gearing up for a busy summer here and I will be helping to lead our Hill to Harbor Discovery Camp Program with local YMCA camps of the greater Boston area. I will also be taking the lead role in managing our Youth Conservation Corp Program, where high school youth aged 15-18 work alongside park staff to facilitate camp programs. There’s been loads of prep work, interviews, and lessons to write and I’m enjoying expanding my reach of working with youth to include high schoolers. Stay tuned for how our summer programming goes!