OUR MISSION, VISION & GOALS
Our Mission and Vision
“CEED’s mission is to connect our community to nature and science with creative use of discovery, art and education”
Our vision aims to:
- Give public purpose and functionality to 60+ acres of land entrusted to us by the Town of Brookhaven and Suffolk County, while working to restore and preserve this precious resource.
- Restore and renovate the historic Washington Lodge, bringing it to life as a center of learning, art, and collaboration centered on a love and respect for nature.
- Educate and inspire people of all ages to care about the environment and protect the fragile ecosystems of our local community, including our bays and oceans, as well as Long Island and the world at large.
To advance toward our vision, we have several short-term and long-term goals.
We welcome everyone in our community to help. Please contact us.
CEED’s Short-Term Goals
• Children are our future and providing both informal and formal education opportunities in nature and science are important for a healthy planet. We offer a multitude of programs, in-school, at libraries and nature organizations and on-site at the Washington Lodge. Please click here for more information.
• To offer exciting and innovative nature experiences, we are developing community programs for adults and children that get people outside and learning about nature. These include nature walks and hikes, gardening and art workshops, storytelling by campfire, birding, nature interpretation, and seasonal festivals. For more information, see our calendar.
• To get kids away from digital screens and immersed in the outdoors, we are expanding our camp programs.
• To make nature experiences and education accessible to more people and foster environmental justice, we are reaching out to underserved communities in our area and identifying sponsors for environmental programming.
• To share our resources and create opportunities for collaboration and a wide range of compatible community programming, we are partnering with organizations such as the Vanderbilt Planetarium, Aishling Forest School, the Gabby Wild Foundation, Friends of Bellport Bay and Wild Heart Nature Connection.
• To increase access to the benefits of the land entrusted to us, we are building trails and interpretive stations, outdoor children’s nature areas, benches, and native and medicinal gardens. To volunteer for trail building and site maintenance, call (631) 803-6780 or email info@ceedli.org.
• Donate today to support this critical project or call 631.803.6780 for a tour or more information. We are thankful to so many talented and generous renovation partners, especially Stephani Heating, for invaluable support and the donation of time and expertise, without which we would have never come this far.
• To teach about animals and encourage nature connection, we are creating humane live animal exhibits. Volunteers add an important part of animal care by socializing and handling our Animal Ambassadors.
• To expand knowledge and give tribute to the community’s local history, we are creating an exhibit that chronicles more than 150 years of the Washington Lodge estate, along with the environmental history of Brookhaven Hamlet.
• To provide opportunities for hands-on conservation, we are working to raise and release Bobwhite Quail, encourage people to build and install bat boxes, replant American Chestnut trees, and complete other community conservation projects that provide care for the natural world around us.
CEED’s Long-Term Goals
Our long-term goals will help make full use of our open space and forested land, the Washington Lodge building, and the potential of our Program Partners.
• To offer a place where kids can explore and learn about the local ecosystem in the woodlands, creek, and bay we hope to create provide accessible, child friendly trails to explore.
• To foster nature-inspired and environmental arts we hope to create a dedicated art studio on the first floor of the Washington Lodge.
• To help people learn to eat and live in a healthy and sustainable way we hope to create a opportunities with our teaching kitchen for preparation of organic and foraged food, herbs and plant-based medicinals.
• To spread knowledge of sustainable technologies we hope to demonstrate the use of green technologies such as geothermal heating, solar energy and composting toilets.
• To provide an affordable home to like-minded organizations and encourage a collaborative green think-tank, we hope to develop a portion of the second floor of the Washington Lodge into a shareable office space for partner organizations that have compatible missions.
• To provide a valuable resource to the scholarly works of Long Island-based naturalists, environmental trailblazers, scholars and activists, we hope to establish an environmental library on the second floor of the Washington Lodge, dedicated to local environmental legend, Dennis Puleston.
• To increase our ability to offer deeper nature experiences, we hope to develop the third floor of the Washington Lodge into a Nature Retreat Center, offering 1-3 day programs with overnight accommodations on topics such as Bee-keeping, Cooking with Nature, Organic Gardening, Wilderness Survival, and Sustainable Living.
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