WOLF School is proud to announce its 2020 Award Winner for WOLF School Staff of the Year–Antonella De La Tore. A naturalist teacher and a true rising leader at the WOLF School, Antonella has been teaching at WOLF since her hire in late 2017. She has been an excellent teacher and leader for her students, and has also become a leader on the staff, leading trainings, improving our systems, and helping create opportunities for our staff to learn to be better teachers. She is a consistent advocate for equity. While Covid-19 has given most WOLF staff a break from teaching after March 2020, Antonella has been busy creating, growing, and working independently to create opportunities for youth.

Antonella is currently in the process of creating a new organization called PUENTES Wilderness Immersion, a Spanish-English multi-week backpacking program for young adults. This program aims to bridge divides that exist due to historical and systemic inequities by providing free opportunities for groups of 10-12 folks to immerse themselves in California landscapes and return to their communities with new experiences and connections. Her program is centered on increasing BIPOC’s access to the outdoors by prioritizing equitable and inclusive programming and a decolonized curriculum. She is hoping to pilot PUENTES in the Summer of 2023 and will be looking for board members soon (if board membership interests you, contact Antonella here via the WOLF School).

She also recently completed the eight month Rising Leaders Fellowship through Youth Outside-- a professional development fellowship program for outdoor educators with a focus in social justice, intentional communication, youth empowerment, curriculum development. Through this fellowship she also received coaching on Trauma Informed Youth Development and is hoping to continue training in the mental health field to be a more well-rounded educator and overall mentor to young people.

We are looking forward to seeing Antonella's future work with youth and offer her our congratulations and many thanks for all her contributions at WOLF School!