New Year New Opportunities

Well, it is almost midnight and the start of a new year - finally. For me every new year is a new opportunity to Teach, Learn, and of course, DO. Next Friday I leave for Korea for a week followed by a trip to England and then wrap up January with a 3-day training course for the Army Corps of Engineers. A very nice way to start the new year. I hope your new year gives you changes to Learn, Teach and Do as well. So Happy New Year! Cheers. jv

Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas everyone - I hope that Santa brought you approved grant funding, more staff, innovative technology, more visitors, and, for some of you, a new roof.
Interpreters give a lot to their visitors each year - thank you all for that. If you are an interpreter - every day can be Christmas and each of you a "Santa".
And the photo - well - just be careful what you ask Santa for....

Korean Alpine Arboretum

Well, it looks like 2010 is going to get off of a very interesting start. We begin our New Orleans project the first week of Jan, but then I will start working on a National Alpine Arboretum project in Korea. We had been working on this in proposal stage for many months now and it finally came through. The only thing I am not looking forward to is the 14 hour flight! I have worked in Korea before, with my friend and associate Dr. Ju-Hee Lee, and we will be working on this projet too. I will post updates and some photos when I return from the first site visit.

On to the Susquehanna River

The NPS Lincoln birth place and boyhood home were great sites and doing the interpretive plan should be fun. With a day of rest I am now off to work on the interpretive services development for the Susquehanna River Corridor. I did the interpretive plan for the corridor last year. This trip I'll work on the self-guiding auto tour including working on the audio CD for the tour. The photo shows a general view of the river in summer (probably be a bit chilly this coming week).

Off to Kentucky

I was recently awarded the contract to develop the interpretive plan for Abraham Lincoln Birthplace National Historical Park, in Kentucky. The Park preserves two farm sites where Abraham Lincoln lived as a child. You can learn more about this NPS site at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abraham_Lincoln_Birthplace_National_Historical_Park. I am heading off to Kentucky on Wednesday for a few days on site to start the interpretive plan. The photo is of the reconstruction of the Lincoln families cabin originally located here.

Mi'kmaq Program Plan

Nova Scotia Department of Natural Resources and NS Tourism, Culture and Heritage. JVA has sub-contracted to Form:Media, a premier Nova Scotia Consulting firm, to assist in the development of a Mi'Kmaq Interpretive Programming Interpretive Plan, for the Provance of Nova Scotia. This project will inventory the wealth of Mi'Knaq First Nation stories in the Province, and how they might be interpreted in NS Provincial Parks. You can visit Form:Media at their web site: http://www.form-media.ca. The project is due to be completed by March/April, 2010.

2010 Interpretive Training Courses

We are planning ahead for 2010 for my two interpretive training courses I offer in Wales, UK. The courses for 2010 include: 19 – 21 May 2010 – Planning and Design of Interpretive Media – Cost £264 and 31 August – 3 September 2010 – Interpretive Master Planning – Cost £357. These courses are offered at Plas Tan y Bwlch (Snowdonia National Park Training Center in Wales). If you would like more details on these coures send me an e-mail (jvainterp@aol.com) and I will send you the course content. We attract participants world-wide. We have have participants from South Africa, Sweden, Channel Islands, the US, and from throughout the UK.

The photos show the training center and one of the class activities from last year.

Louisiana Winter - umm good.

Just got the contract to start work on a host of interpretive media for the Corps of Engineers Bonnet Carre Spillway, located a short drive from New Orleans and located on the Mississippi. We did the interpretive plan last year, and our recommendations were funded for 09/2010. These include several interpretive kiosks, a self-guiding auto tour, interpretive panels at select sites and visitor center exhibits. Matt Kaser, an interpretive designer from Texas will be working with me. It will be cold in MI, so working in Louisiana during winter months will be OK. The photo shows the "long view" of the spillway, which works as a safety valve for Mississippi River water. If the spillway is opened during high river water (a farely rare occurance), the spillway basin is flooded and the overflow is directed to Lake Ponchartrain and into the Gulf. This project will run from November 09 through May of 2010.

Off to England in January.

I have been asked to conduct a 4-day interpretive training course for the staff of the Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire, Northamptonshire and Peterborough in the UK, with a focus in preparing for new interpretive media and services for the Great Fen for 2010. I do a lot of work in the UK and this is a very special site. Training sessions will focus on a general overview of interpretation and interpretive planning, then special sessions on design of interpretive panels, audio guides, school program development, special event planning and web site interpretation. The workshop is scheduled for January 2010. You can learn more about this special place at: http://www.greatfen.org.uk. The photo was taken from one of their on-line newsletters.

Swallowed up by Swallow-wort

Just got back from Robert Wehle State Park in NY for a first look at the invasive Swallow-wort problem, and beginning to think about how to interpret to visitors how they can help in preventing the spread of the plant using proposed seed check stations and other strategies. Thought you might like to see what the plant does to any habitat it gets a root-hold in. Besides growing up to 6 feet a year and shading out native plants, it also produces a chemical that prevents other plants from growing near it. Everything that is brown in this photo blanketing the forest floor, is the Swallow-wort. It is "everywhere" here except in fields where it is mowed. In the fall (in the photo) it produces tons of seeds that look like milk-weed fluff. It even out competes other invasive plants, like garlic mustard!!

Invasive Plant Interpretation

We received a contract from NY State Parks to develop an interpretive plan for using interp. as a management tool to help control the invasive plant Pale Swallow-wort (photo on the left). This will involve interpreting to visitors steps they can use to help control the spread of this plant, via seeds, etc. to other parks or their own homes. We will be looking at boot cleaning stations and clothing seed check stations with brushes so trail walkers can brush themselves off to remove any seeds that might be clinging to them. I will keep you posted on this use of interpretation as a management tool as the project progresses. If you have any interpretive programs to help control invasive plants, let us know and share ideas and successes. Some of our "interpretive ideas" for panel headers at boot cleaning stations include: "Spread the word - not the seeds", and "Give Swallow-wart the bursh off!".

Heitage Destination Consulting

For the past several years I have had the pleasure of working with Cris Emberson in the UK, during his time as head of Norfolk Tourism. About a year a ago Cris and I decided to form HDC, with Cris as the UK Managing Director. We wanted to have a base to bid and work on UK, European Union and other world-wide interpretation, heritage tourism and tourism destination projects. This relationship has really grown and HDC is a huge success. You can visit our web site there at: http://www.heritagedestination.com/. Cris is currently working on a variety of projects in Chili, including a new and innovative interpretive trail. HDC has won a project in Osorno in Northern patagonia to develop a scarecrow sensory trail. The trail will offer a range of sensory experiences including a bare-foot path. Cris will post more information and photos about this innovative project as it develops.








Cris Emberson, Managing Director of HDC conducintg a planning session with clients in Chili.

I recently had my text book published in China. Someone sent me this photo as an example of... well, you get the idea. That' looks like a long walk to hold your thoughts!

Interpretive flypaper

Well, this is something new for me. I call this blog "interpretive flypaper", where I hope new ideas, problem solving and other innovations in interpretation will "stick". Over the past year I have had lots of folks sending me e-mails with questions about different interpretive aspects, from new media to questions about interpretive planning. I thought that this would be a good place for me to provide "free" consulting time to anyone I can help. I will try to answer your questions, give you other resource information or links, or just my best views. Of course, anyone can add to these responses as well. As one philosopher said, "there is nothing more dangerous than having only one good idea". So well see if this works.

I will also post other JVA things that are going on as well, updates on some of our interpretive projects and any innovating ideas we use in developing interpretive plans for sites. I will also list information on interpretive training workshops.

So lets have a conversation. I look forward to meeting you.

John Veverka