NEW YORK, NY (January 17, 2019)— The Open Space Institute (OSI) today announced that it is accepting applications for the 2019 Barnabas McHenry Hudson Valley Awards. The awards are granted to graduate and undergraduate students pursuing research, leadership, and community involvement in New York’s Hudson Valley. The 2019 deadline (see application) is March 8, 2019.
Each year, OSI selects up to four students in the fields of environmental conservation, historic preservation, the arts, and tourism to receive a McHenry Award.
Under the construct of the program, students partner with local non-profits and are awarded up to $5,000, with $1,000 going to the non-profit, to pursue a project that will promote awareness about local history and the environment and invoke positive change. The 12-year-old program is aimed at encouraging and enabling exceptional, conservation-minded students to take an active leadership role in their Hudson Valley community.
“OSI is passionate about recognizing and supporting young conservationists who share our goals to protect and enhance the Hudson Valley and our appreciation for this landscape’s vibrant historic, artistic, and cultural resources,” said Kim Elliman, OSI’s president and CEO. “Each year we are surprised and delighted by the applicants, their project ideas, and their desire to improve their communities. We are excited to be accepting applications for 2019.”
OSI established the McHenry Awards in 2007 to honor the extensive contributions of Trustee Barnabas McHenry, a renowned Hudson Valley environmental philanthropist and conservationist. Over the past eleven years, OSI has committed nearly $247,000 to 46 McHenry Award grantees.
Previous winners have worked on projects that educated and inspired residents, often leading to tangible community resources such as the creation of a walking and biking trail in Ulster County, a local, fresh food market in downtown Newburgh, the creation of interactive educational exhibits about the Hudson River in Beacon, and conducting research on the lives of British Loyalists in Boscobel during the Revolutionary War. Other projects have impacted the Valley through local newspaper publications, academic theses and dissertations, and community panel discussions.
OSI has been working in the Hudson River Valley for more than 40 years. The Hudson River Valley is the landscape where OSI got its start and has left one of its largest conservation legacies—protecting more than 83,000 acres in the region. OSI’s work here has created Sterling Forest State Park and Schunnemunk State Park, significantly expanded the Saratoga National Battlefield Park, and more than doubled the size of Minnewaska, Thacher, Fahnestock, and Moreau Lake state parks.
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