Lost Valley Educational Center

Lost Valley is seeking your support to raise $20,000 to leverage grant funding for ecological restoration across our 80+ acres of diverse forest ecosystems.

Your contributions are already being put to use to support our stewardship goals for 2025, by providing matching funds for a $10,000 habitat restoration grant we've been awarded through Oregon Watershed Enhancement Board (OWEB). Middle Fork Willamette Watershed Council applied for this grant on our behalf to enhance oak savanna habitat on a parcel of land at Lost Valley. This grant requires a match of $2,505 from Lost Valley to complete the project, which will be fully funded by contributions we have already received from this fundraiser! We've also been busy applying for grants and cost share programs with other organizations like the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), which will require larger matches in order to be selected for funding.

Many state and federal grant programs, like those of OWEB and NRCS, require matching funds in order to be considered for funding. So we are seeking your support to raise money for matching funds that will make us eligible for grants that will fund restoration across our 87 acres. These funds will also support Lost Valley to enhance our efforts to carry out this work through community supported stewardship.

Lost Valley is actively conducting ecological restoration through a model of community supported land stewardship. Led by Brian Byers, Lost Valley’s Executive Director and Land Steward, community volunteers, interns, and students perform activities such as coppicing, pollarding, felling, understory management, removal of non-native vegetation, biochar production, and seeding native plant species. This work is guided by our Land Stewardship Plan, a 10-year strategy to restore native ecosystems, enhance wildlife habitat, and increase biodiversity across Lost Valley's 87-acres.

To further these efforts, we are pursuing partnerships with organizations like the Northwest Youth Corps, the Natural Resources Conservation Service, and our local watershed council. As mentioned above, in November 2024, we were selected for a $10,000 grant through OWEB to fund oak savanna habitat restoration on a parcel of land at Lost Valley. This is a big step toward achieving the goals in our Land Stewardship Plan, while also helping us build a long-term relationship with our local watershed council to partner on larger-scale restoration projects in the future.

Lost Valley Education Center is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit whose mission is to educate youth and adults in the practical application of sustainable living skills. We achieve this by offering hands-on courses in ecological design, restoration forestry, and regenerative farming, while we steward this land for future generations. Guided by our Land Stewardship Plan, we consciously tend these 87 acres of diverse forest ecosystems for oak savanna restoration, increased wildlife habitat, biodiversity, and old growth forest characteristics. Right now, we need your help to fund the enhancement of these efforts.

Thank you for being part of our journey to restore critical ecosystems and increase the resilience of our forests!

Lost Valley Education Center is a 501(c)3 nonprofit whose vision is to educate youth and adults in the practical application of sustainable living skills. To support this vision, we are seeking donations to allow us to provide scholarships to 10 low-Income students for our Spring Permaculture Design Course (PDC) and 30-Hour Hands-on Honors Certificate.

Our Permaculture Design Course provides students with knowledge and hands-on experience in ecological design, restoration, sustainable living, regenerative farming, and forestry. We believe that this knowledge is incredibly important, so we keep our course prices as low as we can to make our offerings accessible. The harsh reality is, however, that many people who wish to gain these skills still cannot afford to take our courses, and we consistently receive more scholarship applications than we can afford to provide. Our Education Scholarships Fundraiser seeks to raise $15,700 to enable us to provide scholarships to 10 low-income students for our Permaculture Design Certificate Course this spring. Thank you for supporting low-income students in their pursuit of transformational environmental education!