In February, Loon Echo Land Trust awarded environmental education grants to the Casco Public Library, Harrison Elementary, School Harrison Village Library, Sebago Elementary School, Spaulding Memorial Library and Raymond Village Library to help children learn about ecology and the environment.

Each January schools and libraries in Denmark, Bridgton, Harrison, Naples, Sebago, Casco, and Raymond can submit grant applications to Loon Echo Land Trust to request funds for an environmental program, such as the Chewonki Programs, Maine Audubon Programs, and Lakes Environmental Association programs.

Funds for these grants are made available through Helen Allen and Polly Bartlett Endowments. Helen Allen owned a beautiful hilltop farm on Quaker Ridge in Casco looking out to the western foothills and Mt. Washington. She was one of the first to grant Loon Echo a conservation easement on her 60-acre property so that it would be protected for the future. After her death at the age of 94, Helen Allen’s bequest to Loon Echo allowed the trust to create an endowed environmental education fund to support yearly programs in local schools and libraries.

Since 1998, hundreds of children in the Lakes Region have benefited from these programs. Polly Bartlett was one of the original board members of Loon Echo. A teacher at Sebago Elementary School, each year she treated her third-graders to a winter walk at Maine Audubon. When she died in 2000 at the age of 48, the trust created a fund in her memory to ensure that third-graders at Sebago Elementary School would always take their winter walk.

To learn more about Loon Echo Land Trust’s land conservation initiatives and programs, visit www.lelt.org or call 647-4352.