Ferrum recreation student’s were tasked with helping the Friends of Ferrum Park project (FOFP) throughout the planning phase during the fall semester.
Rec Professor Aaron Conover taught two classes that helped work on the park.
ECT 108–Trail Design and Construction where students worked on designing walking trails throughout the park.
ECT 312–Protected Area Management where students identified and designated areas of the park that needed to be protected or preserved, while also identifying wetlands and grasslands to learn where amenities could be added. This class also designed interpretive signs for the walking trails around the park, showcasing the local environment, local wildlife, and local history.
Conover shared his thoughts on the experience.
“It was a very positive experience collaborating with the Friends of Ferrum Park and being part of the initial planning and development. It was a unique opportunity for students to use the skills they learned in the classroom out in the community,” he said.
Rec Professor Dan Caston taught REC 413-Rec Facility Plan/Develp/Maint, where students were told what amenities the park wanted such as a pavilion, amphitheater, RV park, and playgrounds.
“I’m a big believer in experiential learning, and perspective projects like this enhance what I’m trying to cover in the classroom,” Caston said. “It was a challenging process because everything we were trying to achieve relies on social interaction, communication, and trust. They are all intangibles but critical to success, and things can get muddied.”
Students were tasked with planning where amenities would be located, what materials would be needed, and how much each part of the process would cost. The overall goal for the class was to match the needs of the community with the desires of the organizing group with the realities of economics.
FOFP Director Rebecca Saunders shared her experience working with the college’s students.
“We were lucky enough to work with both Professor Dan Caston’s Rec 415 class and Professor Aaron Conover’s Trail Building class in Fall of 2024. Both student groups went out of their way to understand exactly what the park’s goals were in order to make sure they were helping us as much as possible,” Saunders said.
She said the students did a great job at understanding FOFP’s vision and goals for the park. In Caston’s class, the students’ objective was to find where to place amenities throughout the park while also limiting the impact of the natural wooded environment.
Students also had to take into account accessibility around the park for those with differing mobility needs. At the end of the semester, students presented their comprehensive plans for amenities around the park and how they might look.
Students’ work and recommendations helped FOFP solidify their plans for the RV park location with a few minor changes for running utilities more cost effectively.
“The map and visual references really helped to give our board a more concrete view of how it all may look once completed, which is invaluable to have,” Saunders said.
Conover’s trail-building class chose a path that takes park visitors through multiple park topographies and many historical relics showcasing the local area’s moonshine history.
The Orange Trail is a one-mile trail loop that takes folks through mountain laurel and rhododendron patches and leads you along part of the park’s two creeks, which gets covered by ferns in the spring.
This trail also has decommissioned moonshine stills that are original to the property. Saunders also added that the community has had access to the trail for a couple months now, and FOFP has received only glowing reviews from hikers so far.
“I can’t begin to quantify how much work they’ve saved us–both in planning and labor. They were able to do all of that within two work days. It was absolutely incredible,” Saunders said. “We are so humbled and thankful for the students’ hard work and the college’s support of the park project.
