After serving as the executive director of Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center of Goshen College for five years, Jason Martin was placed on administrative leave on June 25, leading to his resignation on July 23. Becky Overholt, a former farm-hand and regular volunteer at Merry Lea, learned Martin was under administrative leave informally from Doug Vendreley, a Merry Lea board member. “All he said is, ‘FYI, I just want you to know that Jason’s been placed on administrative leave while they investigate him. I can’t say anything more than that,’” Overholt said. The reasoning for Martin’s administrative leave remains confidential....

By Eliza Alemán • September 4, 2025 • News Aaliah Higareda • September 4, 2025 • News

The Michiana Regional Seed Swap, a gathering of growers, gardeners and plant enthusiasts, will meet on Saturday, Jan. 21 at 10 a.m. in the fellowship hall of the Church-Chapel to exchange seeds, discuss varieties and participate in educational sessions.  “The Seed Swap is a nexus point for those interested in everything from vegetable breeding, food sovereignty, the cultural history of food traditions, locally adapted crops in the face of climate change, native landscaping to support wildlife and pollinators, and more,” said Marcos Stoltzfus, director of environmental outreach at Merry Lea Environmental Center.   “The motivations each individual has for why to...

By Sadie Brenneman • January 19, 2023 • News

Goshen College’s environmental learning center, Merry Lea, hosted a community event titled Enchanted Forest at their Farmstead site from Friday, Oct. 21 to Saturday, Oct. 22. The initial Enchanted Forest took place in 1990 and has been held annually thereafter, including through COVID-19.  They celebrated their 32nd anniversary last weekend. “For many families and members of the public, this is an annual event to look forward to. They anticipate it as part of their regular Autumn season,” Marcos Stoltzfus said, director of Environmental Education Outreach at Merry Lea. The event garnered approximately 200 people in previous years, but Stolzfuz says,...

By Kate Bodiker • October 28, 2022 • News

Merry Lea’s annual sustainability summit will return this Saturday after a year off.  In years past, up to 50 attendees from various states gathered at Merry Lea for a long weekend of activities. Because of the pandemic, the event was shortened from three days to a three-hour online program this year. But Tom Hartzell, coordinator of residential undergraduate programs at Merry Lea, said that the “goals remain the same.” Given that it can be “hard to hold attention” for long periods of time online, Hartzell hopes to keep the participants captivated with a variety of sessions, including speakers, breakout groups,...

By Caleb Shenk • February 17, 2022 • News

Students and faculty gathered on the ice of Kesling Wetland at Merry Lea on Sunday for the second annual broomball tournament hosted by the Goshen College Outdoor Pursuits Club.   Merry Lea has been organizing broomball games for over 15 years. It all started when a student, Lisa Zinn, found out about the game over a decade ago and brought it to the small wetland in Indiana.  Broomball is a very simple game and only requires a few items to play: solid ice, a ball, goals and around a dozen old brooms. It is a combination of hockey and soccer.  Students...

By Leah Kauffman • February 11, 2022 • Features

The eight-day, seventy-mile canoe trip that extends from the headwaters of the Elkhart River near Merry Lea all the way to Lake Michigan has been a highlight of the Sustainability Leadership Semester for the past eight years. “The amazing thing about sustainability is how interdisciplinary it is,” said Tom Hartzell, Merry Lea coordinator for residential programs & environmental science educator. “It connects to anything and everything, and the canoe trip is a great example of this. It’s a big highlight for a lot of students.” This year, due to COVID-19, there was some debate as to whether the trip was...

By Luke Vance • September 3, 2020 • Features

This past summer, Heather Gabel, a sustainable food systems and art double major, worked to bring her fields of study together through the Hickory Scholars program, an eight-week experience where students work with professors to conduct research related to Merry Lea Environmental Center’s mission of sustainability. Gabel worked with John Mishler, art gallery director and sculptor, and John Mischler, assistant professor of sustainability and environmental education to create two vibrant sculptures. After researching many topics including the role of art in sustainability efforts as well as welding techniques, she started brainstorming and designing for her own pieces, one of which...

By Erica Gunden • August 27, 2020 • Features

Goat enthusiasts and cheese-curious folks gathered for the first ever goat cheese-making class at Merry Lea on Saturday morning.  Ruth Mischler, assistant professor of SEED education, offered a milking demonstration and taught two goat cheese recipes to a class of 13. Mischler has been working with goats for 14 years, and says she is still humbled by the process of cheesemaking.  “I love seeing the transformation from sunlight to grass to milk to cheese,” she said. We sat in a circle in the kitchen for introductions. Some had driven from more than an hour away, while others were neighbors to...

By Gabe Miller • September 21, 2019 • Features

This Saturday, Dec. 1, Sustainability Leadership Semester (SLS) students Lydia Dyck and Rheannon Starr, both juniors, will be leading a trash cleanup of an old farm dump in the woods on Merry Lea property. Students will have an opportunity to clean up the local environment; the discarded objects will then be used by Goshen College’s sculpture class. Dyck and Starr have been working on finding a creative way to deal with the discarded glass, metal and garbage in the Elkhart watershed as part of SLS at Merry Lea. The dump site is located directly above High Lake and all water...

By Gwen Stephen • November 28, 2018 • News

The last time Skye McKinnell, a senior environmental science major, spent a fall semester on campus was two years ago, in 2016. Back then, McKinnell lived in Goshen College’s Yoder residence hall. Since then, she’s spent a fall semester in China’s Sichuan province on SST, and now she’s at GC’s Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center as part of the college’s Sustainability Leadership Semester (SLS). SLS is a 15 credit, semester-long study of practical sustainable practices for people for whom doing is believing. “I think that SLS is really good for people that have to see something for it to be...

By Carter Mckay-Epp • September 26, 2018 • Features

Reena Ramos, Laura Hochstetler, José Chiquito and Seth Lapp, the four students who are participating in the Sustainability Leadership Semester, are embarking on a journey that will take them through the ecosystems of the Elkhart and St. Joseph rivers all the way to their destination: Lake Michigan. So far, the journey has been an enjoyable one for the participants. “The trip is an important opportunity to navigate the local watershed in the most experiential way possible,” said Ramos, a senior. However, the trip isn’t just interacting with the flora and fauna along the waterways. There is some hard work involved,...

By Kory Stoneburner-Betts • September 14, 2017 • Features

Growing up in south-central Indiana, Jon Zirkle didn’t have many ideas as to what he wanted to do as a career. He found himself in a position many young people find themselves in: a creative, artistic person, with a love for the outdoors, open to the possibilities. Zirkle is an educator and farm manager at Merry Lea Sustainable Farm, part of an environmental center owned by Goshen College. The farm is located in Albion, a 30-minute drive southeast from Goshen. “I didn’t know what I wanted after I left high school, but I know I was passionate about the environment...

By Josh Stoltzfus • March 16, 2017 • Features

This past weekend, while  students gathered outside on the lawn to enjoy warm temperatures, a group of 45 students gathered at Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center for the Fourth Annual Sustainability Summit. This year’s theme: justice. Environmental justice, social justice and the drive to “let justice roll on like a river, righteousness as a never-failing stream!” (Amos 5:24). This is all to facilitate a conversation surrounding ways to create change in one’s own life and community. The weekend began with the showing of the documentary “Eagle Gone” by film-maker Terry Doran, which explores the story of Native Americans in Indiana....

By Emily Kauffman • February 23, 2017 • News

This is the third year of operation for the Sustainability Leadership Semester at Merry Lea, where Goshen College students live on campus in Rieth Village and take a set of courses focusing on what people can do to make their communities more economically and ecologically sustainable. The SLS is open to anyone who wishes to enroll, but it especially serves to complete a concentration in sustainability within GC’s environmental science major. This year there are six participants: senior art major David Pauls, junior peace, justice and conflict studies major Naomi Gross, junior environmental science majors Cecilia Lapp Stoltzfus and Kayla...

By Isaiah Friesen • September 24, 2015 • Features

Despite the heavy rain that washed over Goshen on Friday, ecology students from Goshen College still made it out to Merry Lea Environmental Learning Center for an overnight camping trip. Ryan Sensenig’s Ecology and Evolution class had a lab the following morning, giving the students a chance to explore the 1100-acre facility that includes a lake, acres of prairie, and woods – enough nature to explore for more than just one Saturday. This is the first year that students had this opportunity through their introductory biology class, giving the first year students another chance to get to know the Merry...

By Lydia Good • September 17, 2015 • Features Hayley Mann • September 17, 2015 • Features