Hi Everyone:
I'm in the process of designing a citizen science habitat monitoring program that builds on the idea of geocaching. The site will be up in about a month at http://www.NatureCache.org In addition, I'm running a GPS fossil hunt for the New York State Envirothon.
So, I've had quite a bit of interaction on both sides.
There is a lot of energy for this activity. Someone already mentioned that it even attracts teen boys!!!
But no one has yet mentioned the boundless educational opportunity.
Geocaching utilizes math & mapping skills, teaches geography, technology, atmospheric science, and I've designed my programs around habitat management and climate change.
As great as I think the educational opportunties are, however, I won't pretend that hiding trinkets on nature preserve land is not an issue.
The National Park Service and many other governmental parks and preserve lands do _NOT_ allow geocaching. They _DO_, however, allow other geocaching-like games. The Geological Society of America has a non-cache geocaching-like game to guide visitor education at sites of geological interest, see http://www.EarthCache.org These sites do _NOT_ allow anyone to hide anything. The "cache" is that you get to see a great geological location. The "cache" on the site I'm developing is that you get to participate in a citizen science research project. And I'll hide the fossils caches for the Envirothon for less than 12hrs.
Obviously, I think you should go beyond _allowing_ geocaching...
...I think you should put your cache in your newsletter, have a family GPS outing with geography education... or whatever fits your institution. If you look at EarthCache.org, you'll see that many of the 492 locations are in National Parks even though NPS forbids geocaching. The Park Interpreters write the educational text to go along with those locations... ie: they forbid geocaching, but they use the energy it inspires. I'd like to hear of more programs like that!
have fun
diane
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