Earthroots Field School Inc

Earthroots is dedicated to cultivating a sense of care and connection between people and the natural world. Earthroots inspires life-long dedication to environmental stewardship and community through deep nature connection mentoring.

Earthroots Field School founder, Jodi Levine, grew up in a very different Orange County than children know today. Raised in San Clemente, she fell in love with the swampy trails behind her home where she and her brother walked down the hill after school each day to catch tadpoles, build tree forts and follow the animal tracks to their dens. It was a place to have unlimited adventures, grow strong, feel the freedom of nature and build trust with her brother. Jodi was devastated when bulldozers came to develop her cherished wild place into a heavily landscaped golf course, and the animals she had come to love were displaced and never returned. It was from this profound connection with nature in her formative years, coupled with unique travels and experiences in her young adulthood, that eventually led her to back to Orange County with a desire to ensure children and adults would have opportunities to deeply connect with the earth. With this passion, Jodi founded Earthroots Field School in 2005. Since 1980, much of Orange County’s wild, open, natural space has been developed into roads, manicured golf courses, parking lots and shopping centers, leaving a mere 15% of park land. This has created a disconnect between people and the natural world, felt more strongly by today’s youth than any other time in human history. Richard Louv and researcher Cheryl Charles, Ph.D. of the Children and Nature Network, note that this “nature deficit” affects children in profound ways. Low levels of outdoor activity and a sedentary lifestyle are common and may be related to the dramatic rise in childhood obesity, vitamin D deficiency and other health issues. Additionally, studies indicate that a connection with the outdoors supports social, intellectual, emotional, spiritual and physical development, supports creativity and problem-solving skills, enhances concentration and lessens attention deficit disorder behaviors. Once an adult grows up without a connection to nature, they lose the ability to pass critical developmental knowledge onto their children. Earthroots recognizes the natural environment as a fundamental, effective, and holistic setting for learning. Drawing on the philosophies of traditional native wisdom, cultural knowledge, peacemaker principles, and community building practices, we believe that an education rooted in nature prepares young people to be engaged, thoughtful stewards of the environment, and consequently, productive citizens of society.

Since its inception, Earthroots Field School has mentored thousands of people in nature, including both program participants and volunteers, totaling over 100,000 hours spent connecting with the earth and creating a healthier community with the knowledge and experience to be better stewards of the planet. Additionally, each Earthroots participant gained meaningful skills, built confidence, physical strength and coordination, while developing an understanding of and foundation in ecoliteracy—the understanding of the natural systems that make life on our planet possible.
For our younger participants, these new skills and understandings supported the academic standards being taught in the classroom, directly relating to the California Next Generation Science Standards. Earthroots activities and programs offer hands on experience that provides a foundation for many of the disciplinary core ideas and performance expectations for students at every grade level. Direct interaction with the natural world helps students to engage in the rigorous thinking and problem solving required by both the Common Core and Next Generation Science Standards. Earthroots experiences make classroom instruction meaningful as students connect what they do in nature to the academic content they are provided by their teachers.
This year Earthroots is looking forward to expanding our outreach in the community by bringing more of our programming to communities without access to or experience in nature. By working directly with schools and nonprofit organizations, we hope to extend our reach to all of Orange County, while continuing to focus on projects at our 39-acre facility, Big Oak Canyon, which will enable us to expand our on-site offerings while being the best possible stewards of the land and its resources.

Earthroots is committed to offering our programs, free of charge, to school districts desiring to offer ecoliteracy programs to their students but lacking the resources to do so. Ongoing fundraising to bring programs to students, pre-kindergarten through 5th grade, will address this need, made even more necessary as a result of the impact the pandemic had on education in our county. Approximately $25,000 allows us to put a full curriculum in place for one full school year for one middle school.
At Big Oak Canyon, a two-phase project will enable us to remove an existing storage facility with a failing roof. The removal of the building will allow that land to become a wetland restoration project involving the community and serving as a learning and training opportunity. The site is extremely special and unique for Southern California in that it has natural spring water flowing year-round, and a creek with a great deal of shade and native tree cover. One of the priorities for the site is maintaining it for the greatest diversity of native plants and animals, and for clean water. The materials from the demolition of the existing structure will be recycled as walkways in our on-site orchard.
A new combination storage facility and welcome center will be comprised of 2 - 20 foot shipping containers. Surrounded by native plants used to weave baskets, this area will serve as an educational project, while additional parking created at the site will make additional visitors possible. The first phase costs are anticipated to be $45,000 and the second phase costs are anticipated to be $35,000.
In 2024, invasive beetles were discovered at Big Oak Canyon, interrupting the intricate ecological balance on the land. The Gold Spotted oak borers (GSOB) do not have local natural predators sufficient to control their populations, and many mature Coast Live Oak trees have died. Creating a Forestry Management Plan, experimenting with non-toxic solutions, and increasing care for the affected trees is a top priority. Approximately $85,000 will cover expenses to create a Forest Management Plan and one year of implementation.
Earthroots is seeking to add interested, qualified members to our board of directors.

Our programs are offered throughout Orange County at beaches and coastal parks as well as inland to the Santa Ana mountains. We meet at various Wilderness Parks, Organic Farms and Beaches, though the majority of programs are offered at our 39-acre wilderness property in Silverado Canyon (92676).

Since its founding in 2005, Earthroots has been creating opportunities for people to transform through new and deepening connections with nature. We have grown both programmatically and structurally to enable the organization to serve an ever-broadening range of local residents including school children, families, universities, and businesses. While the last several years have presented many challenges for Earthroots, we have learned great lessons in overcoming them and grown even closer to our community. This period of challenge and change has reminded us to look to the land as our teacher. Nature is life-focused, forgiving, and resilient. As a result of lessons learned Earthroots Field School has embarked on some bold projects designed to expand our service. We hope you connect with us and our vision as we learn from the land and teach others to do the same, as we tend to the land and its resources, as we focus not only on today’s youth but on future generations.

I have had the pleasure of knowing Jodi Levine as a young woman, developing the skills and passion that led to the creation of Earthroots Field School. Since then she has shared those skills and passion with the Orange County community. Everyone she has come in contact with, young and old alike, has developed a deeper connection with nature, a more intimate understanding of the natural world, and we are all the better for it. The future of Earthroots and the role it can play in helping Orange County become physically and mentally healthy stewards of the land should not be underestimated. It has been my joy to support Earthroots in their mission. I invite you to join me.