Cheers to the Kickemuit Middle School PTO, students and hundreds of residents from these towns for coming together and providing the financial aid needed to continue Nature’s Classroom, a beloved week-long trip into the woods that gives middle schoolers hands-on lessons in science, math, engineering, botany, wildlife, creativity, teamwork and many other disciplines.

Learning earlier this year that the state would no longer allow districts to compel parents to pay for field trips that serve an educational purpose, volunteers stepped in and raised $45,000 to fund the yearly trip.

While their efforts were appreciated by the 170 students currently traipsing through the woods in Charlton, Mass., we hope a less demanding, permanent solution can be found to help fund important programs like this, and countless other trips students enjoy — and learn from — every year. Holding endless fund-raisers will be difficult for a group of ever-changing volunteers to sustain long-term.