A portrait of Kenneth C. Welch is framed above the glass display cases and mounted wildlife specimens in the classroom of the Outdoor Learning Center that bears his name. Although he retired in 1994, Welch still makes an appearance at the annual Outdoor Learning Center Folk Life Festival each spring, dressed in Texas pioneer garb to greet volunteers at the festival’s chuck wagon station.
Founded in 1981, Katy ISD opened the Outdoor Learning Center on 34.5 acres of wooded land about a quarter of a mile west of the Leonard E. Merrell Center and Katy High School. Welch said the land was located in a hundred-year flood plain, so the district was able to purchase the land to develop an outdoor classroom.
“The thought initially was to do something in an outdoor setting where kids who grow up in subdivisions—where they don’t have woods available, they don’t have a lake available—where kids can learn to fish and experience the outdoors. We have a summer recreation program out here. The kids come out for half a day for two weeks and do all types of outdoor activities,” Welch said.
The center has provided hands-on science and history classes for district students since its inception. Elementary and secondary curriculum specialists developed targeted life science and social studies programs, including an annual fourth-grade “Adaptations” field trip where students rotate through stations to learn about Texas wildlife.
