Making Friends, Preserving Lands

Hands on learning.

Across Arizona, young people are looking for a place to belong—friends who understand them, adults who see their potential, and places that feel like home. Through our youth outreach days with partners like the Bryan Brown Youth Academy, Wild Arizona Youth Conservation Corps, and the San Lucy District Summer Youth Workers program, we help teens build friendships with one another, with their cultures, and with the lands that hold their stories.

On Arizona Gives Day, you can help us say “yes” to more youth, more camp days, more storytelling circles, and more chances for young people to see themselves as caretakers of culture and conservation.

MAKING FRIENDS, FINDING BELONGING

For many of the youth we work with, spending a day together on the land is a rare chance to make new friends—and to see old friends in a new light. At the Bryan Brown Youth Academy on Babad Do’ag (Mount Lemmon), competition and play quickly turn shy teens into laughing teammates as they throw atlatl darts, side-arm rabbit sticks at stuffed animals, and create pendant necklaces together.Learning to throw atlatls.

In San Lucy, a hot summer day indoors becomes a space for quiet conversation, teasing, and shared jokes as youth etch shells, ask questions about archaeology careers, and talk about what it means to grow up in their community today. These simple moments of friendship are powerful medicine that help young people feel seen, supported, and connected.Learning about etching designs into shells.

Learning that Makes an Impact

Our youth outreach days are designed so that learning starts with doing. Instead of long lectures, participants jump straight into activities:

• Throwing replica atlatls and rabbit sticks while hearing how these tools appear in the archaeological record and remain important in Indigenous life today.
• Making pendants and etched shells while talking about identity, culture, and the places they call home.
• Participating in “Hidden Narratives,” an interactive card game that asks them to piece together a timeline of colonization, conservation law, and Indigenous resilience—and then talk honestly about what it means for them and their communities now.

These days are about more than skills. Participants leave with shared memories, new friendships, and a deeper understanding that land, culture, conservation, and archaeology are intertwined, not separate.

Making shell pendants.

WHY YOUR GIFT MATTERS 

These programs run on relationships—and on your support. Each youth outreach day requires:

• Staff and Tribal partners who are trusted in the community and can show up year after year.
• Materials for hands-on activities: replica tools, traditional foods, art supplies, and educational resources like the “Hidden Narratives” cards.
• Travel to communities and remote locations such as the Chiricahua Mountains, Mount Lemmon, and Great Bend of the Gila, where many young people rarely get to engage with archaeologists and conservation professionals.Learning about plants at Bryan Brown.

With your Arizona Gives Day gift, we can:

• Return to the Bryan Brown Youth Academy and welcome a new cohort of teens each summer.
• Camp with the Wild Arizona Youth Conservation Corps and meet Indigenous youth who are already stepping into conservation roles.
• Spend more time with San Lucy youth workers, answering their questions about jobs, college, and how they can protect the places and stories they care about.

Every dollar helps turn “once in a lifetime” into “every summer.”

YOUTH VOICES, LASTING IMPACT

After these days together, participants often come up to quietly say “thank you”—for teaching them, for talking honestly about hard histories, or just for being there and listening. Some share that they’ll remember specific stories, like the theft of cultural items and the community-led work to bring them home, and others ask how they can pursue archaeology or cultural resource work themselves.Learning about the history of the area.

These are the moments when friendship turns into leadership. A teen who laughs over pendant-making today may be the archaeologist, park ranger, or Tribal cultural officer who protects sacred sites tomorrow. Your support helps us stand with them at that turning point.

CALL TO ACTION  

This Arizona Gives Day; will you be a friend to the next generation?

Your gift will:

• Connect Indigenous and non-Indigenous youth through fun, hands-on days on the land.
• Create safe spaces for conversation about history, healing, and hope.
• Nurture the future leaders who will protect Arizona’s cultural heritage and landscapes.

Give today and help us keep showing up—with our atlatls and rabbit sticks, our “Hidden Narratives” cards, our stories, and our listening hearts—so that every young person we meet knows they are not alone. Please help us reach our goal by May 31, 2026 of $5000 to continue such amazing youth outreach programs. 

GIVE NOW - Help youth make friends with each other, the land, and their own powerful futures.