Art & Politics of Walking class partners with City of Kenmore to create Geocaching project

Jason Frederick Lambacher’s BCORE class — The Art & Politics of Walking — partnered with the City of Kenmore throughout the fall of 2024 to create an Adventure Lab for their new park (Tl -awh-ah-dees), which is near the junction of Swamp Creek and the Sammamish River. An Adventure Lab is a particular kind of Geocaching experience whereby users can learn about a place by proceeding through a series of stages after answering certain clues on an app. Students worked in project teams to design stages on the original inhabitants of the area; the change in the park’s name to Lushootseed nomenclature; research on the 2015 bond measure called Walkways & Waterways, which provided funds to refurbish the park; and various ecological restoration efforts to promote native plants & trees and provide habitat for birds and salmon. Planning began in the summer of 2024 when Dana Washington from the Office of Connected Learning brought together Lauren Chomiak (Tourism Manager for the City of Kenmore) and Jeff Weaver, a Kenmore resident and Geocaching enthusiast, convened a meeting to discuss a project that would help promote this new park to local residents. The result, after several visits to the park and independent research by students, is this Adventure Lab experience, which can be found here and completed by downloading the Adventure Lab app and experiencing the park through the student’s research: Adventure Lab link