Project wild (PW) is an interdisciplinary conservation education program focusing on wildlife and habitat

Since 1983, the program has delivered high-quality, well-tested conservation education to the public by equipping and training teachers and other educators. Over the past 40 years, over 1.5 million educators have been trained in PR activities, reaching over 100 million young people. The goal of the program - which was collaboratively developed by state wildlife agencies and state education agencies - is to develop awareness, knowledge, skills, and commitment resulting in informed decisions, responsible behavior, and constructive actions concerning wildlife and the environment. This proposal outlines our request to create three project wild online courses for formal and non-formal educators, based on needs identified by state fish and wildlife agencies. Specifically, state fish and wildlife agency educators and biologists will be asked about wildlife study findings or management efforts that are funded under the wildlife restoration act and would benefit from the development of regional or national scale education resources to help establish foundational awareness and understanding of these issues among educators and students participating in project wild. PW has been a respected name among educators and wildlife professionals alike. Educators consistently rate PW training and materials as engaging, relevant and useful. In a time when state fish and wildlife agencies focus on the relevancy of conservation to the public, the PW program represents a valuable tool to reach young people in diverse settings, connect them to the outdoors, and instill sound conservation concepts.while the content of PW curricula and activity guides remains much sought after, the delivery method has become a barrier to meeting the needs of today s educators. Educators have attended a one-day professional development training for decades to receive a printed copy of the PW guide, experience activities from the guide, and learn more about wildlife and conservation in their state. In recent years, various factors have caused national training numbers to decline, including industry changes in educator professional development and book printing and increasing demand for online learning and resources exacerbated by the covi-19 pandemic. In 2019, PW piloted its first online course and has since developed five additional courses with the support of other grants. Similarly, in 2022 PW started publishing a new wildlife education unit. Climate wildlife is a 64-page module that provides middle and high-school-level educators with a collection of PW lessons created for the national fish, wildlife, and plants climate adaptation strategy. This 2024 multistate conservation grant project will allow PW to build on this momentum with an additional three courses and three thematic wildlife education units using existing PW activities. Online PW professional development training allows educators to access modules at their own pace without waiting for a training event at a convenient time and location. Beyond the online training, the education units will keep printing costs low so that price is not a barrier to our partners. These additions to the PW suite of offerings will allow the program -and messages of fish and wildlife agencies- to stay relevant to educators and students across the country.