Page 170 - Middleborough 2024 Town Report

SOULE HOMESTEAD
EDUCATION CENTER
We’ve had so many of our wonderful young, younger,
new, and long-time volunteers continue to help out in
ways big and small around Soule, putting in well over
3,900 people hours of work to help us in fulfilling our
programming, events, and our mission. We revitalized
our teen programs - Leaders in Training & Counselors in
Training - and plan to expand these two programs even
more in 2025. Long time Board Member Jef Stevens was
selected as our Volunteer of the Year award recipient.
In 2024, we hosted over 2,000 children in various
educational programs at Soule from field trips, holiday
vacation programs, summer camps, first farm fun,
birthday parties, and other education focused programs.
The heart of the majority of these programs
are agri-ecology and conservation based focused
to help serve our community, as well as support and fulfill
our mission.
Extension educator Blake Dinius to provide a free
educational program (and he discovered a rare
Baltimore Checkerspot that hasn’t been seen in our area
for a long time at Soule), as well as hosted our own
events like participating in the Great Backyard Bird
Count. We’ve brought back Owl Programs, and Star
Walks too. We continue to rebuild long-standing events,
such as Sheep Day and Harvest Fair, which survived the
most dificult days of the early Covid years. We saw over
1,708 workshop, event, & program attendees at SHEC
throughout the year.
We have added new workshops and tried to diversify our
oferings while still sticking largely to our slow crat roots,
invested in tried and true workshops, and also brought in
new artists and teachers to help further our mission. We
hosted thirtyfive workshops, twelve programs, and eight
annual events - 7 which were free, and of which 22 which
were under $15. SHEC added new events like our
Luminaria Walk, worked with Plymouth County
SHEC has been working on some important Capital
Improvements related to buildings here at the Center,
including the Phase 1 residing of the West side of the
historic home, and some much needed repairs and
improvements to the East Classroom - which included
new windows, new siding, and a new watertight roof.
Soule Homestead Education Center is so incredibly
thankful to have the support of the Middleborough CPC,
Pierce Trustees, and other generous community
partners in these important capital improvements.
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