Joshua York

Since 2004, before Last Child in the Woods was published, Joshua helped lead MetroParks into an era of Nature Play, creating several Nature Play Areas where kids could engage in a variety of nurturing play activities while not impacting biologically sensitive areas. The creation of these areas and MetroParks' leadership in accepting liability of outdoor play has put MetroParks in the national spotlight.

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Joshua and his team has also developed programming built around the concept of play, including the Get Them Outside program, funded partially through the Ohio Environmental Education Fund. This programming taught families the benefits of living an outdoor lifestyle versus the perilous dangers of an indoor childhood. This program was recognized as an Outstanding Project by OEEF; supporting documentation and photographs can be found below.