IMPORTANT NOTE: Due to the need for materials given by Fairchild and a significant commitment toward this scientific venture, only registered schools that had at least one teacher attend the MOP workshop or have express written permission from the Challenge Team may participate in this Challenge. If you have any questions or concerns regarding this, please email challenge@fairchildgarden.org.

YOUR CHALLENGE:

The Million Orchid Project (MOP) is the largest botanical citizen science program in South Florida that focuses on restoring rare, native orchids. This year we’re bringing our biggest conservation project yet to Challenge schools! As the global climate warms, geographic ranges of tropical plants can expand to areas that were once too cold for them. For this Challenge, we want you to design and run a survivorship experiment that tests how a critically endangered ground orchid species grows in two different environments in your schoolyard. These two environments can be chosen by you and your teacher — it could be a sunny space, a shady space, in an existing pollinator garden,  under a tree, or somewhere else you have in mind. After receiving 10 Florida-native orchids from Fairchild, plant half of them in one of your chosen environments and half in another. Along with monitoring and taking care of the orchids, we want you to document your experience. 

The data you collect will be put into a shared document with other schools. Use the collective data of your own school and others to create a short documentary style video interpreting the effect of your treatments on orchid survivorship. The presentation should include why you are conducting your survivorship experiment, graphs of the data collected, and information about the different microhabitats you selected. These interpretations will be shared with our orchid biologist for them to understand the data you collected and any findings you describe in your interpretation. Download information as one page with lesson plan

CHALLENGE RESOURCES:

• • Mandatory In-person Teacher Workshop – September 27, 2025 from 9:30 pm to 11:30 am. 
  • Demonstration on how to attach an orchid to a tree
  • Orchid Care Sheets
  • 2023 USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map | USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map
  • The Million Orchid Project website