Nature school to celebrate syrup season with festival

Sugar on Snow, a two-day festival celebrating maple sugar season for the public and students at Sugar Maple Nature School, will be held Tuesday and Wednesday, March 24 and 25.

The public features include a community celebration from 4 to 7:30 p.m. Tuesday and a pancake breakfast from 9 to 11 a.m. Wednesday that will benefit the food pantry at Family Sharing in Grafton.

For Sugar Maple Nature School, maple sugaring is more than a seasonal event — it’s a reflection of the school’s identity, officials said.

“We want learning to be alive and connected to the world around our students,” Cindy Raimer, director of education, said. “This experience brings science, culture and community together in a way that makes education both meaningful and memorable.”

The program begins with immersive student programming on Tuesday, with students rotating through hands-on stations. They will test their observation skills in a winter tree identification challenge course where they will need to consider bark, branching patterns and other clues, a bucket drumming station where they will explore sound and celebration through music, and a Science of Syrup station where they will conduct experiments measuring mass, density, viscosity and light absorption as they investigate the transformation of sap into syrup.

“This is learning as it was meant to be,” Raimer said. “When students are outdoors, investigating real phenomena and engaging all of their senses, they understand not just the what but the why behind what they’re studying.”

Rick Gonzalez of the Oneida Nation will also share the Indigenous traditions and teachings behind maple sugaring with students.

The free Tuesday community celebration will include a variety of hands-on activities, including taking a tree identification challenge course, horse-drawn wagon rides through the park, exploring the trails by snowshoe, listening to live music by Luke Cerny, watching maple sap being boiled into syrup, making traditional sugar on snow candy and hearing a 5 p.m. presentation by Gonzalez.

On Wednesday, donations for Family Sharing will be taken during the free breakfast.

“The pancake breakfast is about more than sharing a meal — it’s about living our value of community,” Sugar Maple School Director of Community Outreach and Development Jeff Kierzek said.

The events are sponsored by Sugar Maple Nature School, the Ozaukee County Historical Society, Ozaukee County Planning and Parks Department, Round Room Gives, JL Business Interiors, WB Sausage Plus, Big Joe’s Gas Station and Performance Foodservice.