Our project work 2017-2018 was in Sonoma, Mendocino and Lake Counties. This effort for the first time reached into these last two counties, as schools in Mendocino and Lake Counties were added to our project list.
The selected school in Mendocino County is Anderson Valley Elementary School (AVES), where over 85% of the students receive free or reduced price meals. AVES is a rural school, located in a predominantly agricultural valley along bisected by Highway 128 which connects coastal northern California with the interior coastal range valleys. Enrollment in 2016-2017 was 276 students. The two selected schools in Lake County were Lower Lake Elementary and Lake County International School. Nearly 75% of Lake County children are eligible to receive free or reduced cost lunches. Lower Lake Elementary is located in the community of Lower Lake, and the school was damaged by wildfires in 2016. Lake County International School is located in Middletown, a town which was 50% destroyed by wildfires in 2015. Both areas were also impacted by the wildfires of 2017.