I had no idea our state offered a course by which an enrolled student could be certified as a Pennsylvania Master Naturalist. That is until last week when I was invited to participate in one of their programs by Citialy Weed, the Education Coordinator for the Brandywine Red Clay Alliance.
Weed asked me if I would be willing to teach a session on Creatures of Southeastern Pennsylvania.
My task would be to cover the unit on Pennsylvania mammals.
As an avid outdoorsman and retired high school English teacher (and since our Northbrook homestead is less than a mile away from the BRCA classroom), I agreed to act as an instructor. Then I immediately got to work assembling a PowerPoint presentation that covered topics ranging from adaptation to evolution by natural selection and descriptions of the difference between specialist and generalist wildlife species among other things. Weed advised me that there would be 10 students, all adults, attending the Tuesday night class.
To supplement the PowerPoint, I figured a few other handouts would be appropriate. To that end I stopped by state Rep. Christina D. Sappey’s office in Unionville where I picked up a dozen 85-page booklets of Wildlife Notes, Volume 2, Mammals, provided by the Pennsylvania Game Commission.
And because sections of the Master Naturalist course emphasize wildlife management, I also stopped at Dick’s Sporting Goods where I procured a dozen of the PGC’s Hunting and Trapping Digests for 2025-2026 since the Game Commission is the agency that manages big game animals, small game animals, and furbearers.
I learned that the Pennsylvania Master Naturalist is a statewide partnership initiative that aims to connect people with their local ecosystems through intensive natural science training and local conservation service work.
It is a venture directed toward developing a local corps of master volunteers and service providers to offer education, outreach, and service dedicated to the understanding and management of natural areas within their communities.
Pennsylvania Master Naturalist works closely with a coalition of community and conservation organizations like the Brandywine Red Clay Alliance to ensure that they have the necessary volunteer leadership to address the most pressing conservation needs and challenges. The year-round program has three components: the initial volunteer training course, volunteer service, and continuing education.
According to Weed, Master Naturalist students pay a tuition of $400 for a program that runs for 13 weeks and meets once a week (in this case Tuesdays) from 6:30 p.m. to 8 p.m. each night. I presented one part of Unit 4, “Creatures of Pennsylvania.” Other units included titles like “Water in the Landscape,” “Forests, Fields, and Meadows,” “Rocks, Ice and Dirt,” and more.
All Master Naturalists receive an in-depth, 50-hour training in natural history, natural sciences, biodiversity, and nature interpretation. Service hours give Master Naturalists an opportunity to apply the knowledge and skills they have learned during the training. After the initial training course, trainees must complete at least 30 hours of service in order to become certified PA Master Naturalist volunteers. To remain certified, volunteers must complete 20 hours of service each subsequent year.
Adults interested in deepening their knowledge of and connection to the natural world and the local conservation community through natural science education and volunteer service are perfect candidates to become PA Master Naturalist volunteers.
The payoff is that since 2010, Pennsylvania Master Naturalist volunteers across the state have engaged in more than 117,000 hours of conservation service, contributed over $3 million in conservation value and impact to regional partners reached over 187,000 people through outreach service and improved 9,000 acres of habitat and 1,400 miles of waterways through stewardship service.
For more information about the PA Master Naturalist programs visit their website at PAmasternaturalist.org. For more information about environmental education programs offered by the Brandywine Red Clay Alliance check out their website at www.brandywineredclay.org or call them at 610-793-1090.
Tom Tatum is the outdoors columnist for the MediaNews Group. You can reach him at tatumt2@yahoo.com.
