Nov. 19 2025 | Jaylin Emond-Hardin | Entertainment Editor
On Nov. 13, the Wild and Scenic Film Festival celebrated its 10th year in Corvallis and was hosted by the Corvallis Environmental Center. The Corvallis Environmental Center, a non-profit founded in 1994, focuses on creating a healthy, sustainable community through educating students from pre-kindergarten to eighth grade on environmental wellness, leadership development and food security.
Featuring 10 films on topics from conservation to outdoor sports, the festival aimed to inspire the community through a love of nature. This year, the festival’s message centered on hope, aiming to draw attention to the ways people are making a difference in the world by working to bring change in their communities.
This year, the films were screened at Whiteside Theatre in Corvallis, a 30-minute drive from Western and six minutes from Oregon State University. The festival also offered on-demand tickets, where viewers could watch each film from the comfort of their home. These on-demand screenings were available on the Corvallis Environmental Center’s website Nov. 13 through 19.
The center provided these films to the Corvallis School District free of charge for teachers to view the films in their classrooms with their students.
“We want to share these films with everyone who cares for this planet we call home. We believe that is everyone,” said Corvallis Environmental Center Outreach Coordinator Karen DeWolfe.
“Films are a powerful way of sharing stories from other communities. It is powerful to see other people effectively making a change,” she added. “Film also helps show us how beautiful our world is, and I think this can inspire us to take additional steps to care for our planet.”
My favorite was the second film, “Friends of Frogpool Lane,” which was produced by Freshwaters Illustrated in partnership with Amphibian Friends, an organization in eastern Pennsylvania that the short film also follows. It was founded in 2010 by Kim White and her husband after she saw an article about amphibian migrations on a busy road near their newly-purchased property. From there, White discovered a vernal pool on her property, a seasonal wetland that typically appears in the spring and grows through the rainy season. They are the ideal habitat for frogs and salamanders to mate and spawn in, since the pools cannot sustain fish life. Vernal pools are highly endangered habitats, with as many as 50% of vernal pools in the Eastern United States being lost or impacted.
Every year for the last 15 years, on rainy nights in February and March, Amphibian Friends sets out with the help of 25 volunteers to assist the migration of thousands of salamanders and wood frogs.
In 2023, the Whites’ vernal pool was permanently protected through a conservation agreement with the French and Pickering Creeks Conservation Trust. The film ends with the message “Help amphibians migrate by driving slow on rainy spring nights and protecting migration corridors.”
Wild and Scenic’s flagship festival is held annually in Nevada City, California and Grass Valley, California, before hitting the road for the On Tour program. There are currently around 110 stops and events in this program, with more than 38,000 people being reached annually. Each stop is supported by local environmental organizations, which then donate the proceeds to local social programs.
This year, the proceeds from the festival went to the Corvallis Environmental Center’s Food for Families program, various scholarships for the center’s youth programs and growing fruits and vegetables at Straker Arts Garden for Education.
“Food for Families is centered on our one-acre education garden, SAGE,” DeWolfe said. “We grow ~5,000 lbs of fresh, sustainable produce annually to supply local food for people most in need in our community.”
Food for Families delivers in-season fruits and vegetables from the Straker Arts Garden for Education to emergency food agencies in Corvallis, including the South Corvallis Food Bank, Stone Soup Kitchen and the Oregon State University Emergency Food Pantry. They are able to do this with the help of over 300 volunteers, interns and staff at the Center.
This is Wild and Scenic’s 23rd year, with the next edition — as the festival calls itself on its website — slated for Feb. 19 through 23. The event is expected to occur again next year. Specifics have yet to be released, but students can keep an eye out to contribute to the cause.
“The Film Festival has helped us make connections with amazing local filmmakers, like Chelsea Jolly and Dave Herasimtschuk,” DeWolfe said. “It brings our community together to celebrate the beauty of our planet and the people we share it with. And it helps us come together for a night of feeling hopeful.”
“I believe and I hope it helps all of us realize we can be the change we want to see in the world,” she added.
Contact the author at howlentertainment@wou.edu
