LYNNFIELD — The Tree Committee met Monday night to discuss how the first year of Squeaky the Squirrel’s Great Green Quest went and how they can improve the program for future years.
The Great Green Quest was a scavenger hunt the Tree Committee created to inspire Lynnfield residents to get out into nature while learning about ways to better protect the environment.
The Tree Committee partnered with the Lynnfield Public Library and had additional support from the Lynnfield Art Guild and Lynnfield Conservation Commission to create the Great Green Quest.
The first concern of the Committee was that not many participated, as only seven groups finished Squeaky’s Great Green Quest. Some groups began the journey only to stop halfway through, but many Lynnfield residents did not choose to participate.
“My issue is, you know, we have 13,000 people. Say 3,000 went on vacation. Well, what did the other 10,000 do? We were only asking for 50 (participants),” Tree Committee Chair Jane Bandini noted.
When discussing ways to get more interaction next year, the Committee considered hosting this scavenger hunt at a different time of year and creating more engagement prior to the Quest’s beginning, among many ideas.
The Committee emphatically agreed that Squeaky the Squirrel’s Great Green Quest should come back next year, but there would need to be some adjustments made to garner more engagement.
Another issue the Tree Committee hopes to tackle is accounting for human error and ensuring no one gets lost while completing the Quest.
Even Tree Committee member Alison McKendree mentioned that she made some mistakes along the journey because she was confused over the instructions.
“It said to go toward the second island. We interpreted it wrong. We thought it meant go to the second island, and of course it didn’t say that at all,” she said.
Committee member Melanie Lovell suggested that additional hints and clues on the website would help people find Squeaky if they chose to take the additional help.
“We could have a hidden clue at the bottom of each website,” she suggested. “You select, like, black font on a black background, but if you hold your cursor over it, it highlights the text, and then it reveals the clue.”
Lovell joked that “it is a scavenger hunt” and “there is some scavenging required,” but “if we’re doing our job right, we’re giving them clear enough instructions that most people can find it.”
She added, “We want people who don’t spend time in the woods to spend time in the woods.”
The winners of this year’s Quest were sisters Jackie and Madelyn Ing.
“It’s important to the Tree Committee to introduce middle schoolers to environmental awareness. We just need to figure out our messaging,” Lovell said.
