Family playing with autumn leaves at Brockhole copyright Thomas Beecham

John Muir Award

John Muir Award logo

The John Muir Award is a national environmental award scheme. It encourages people to connect with, enjoy and care for wild places.

The Award is open to all and is run by the John Muir Trust. You can take part as a group, family or individual. Taking part within the Lake District National Park will help develop an understanding of this special place and enable you to look after it.

What's involved?

To achieve a John Muir Award everyone taking part needs to complete

Four challenges:

  • Discover a wild place
  • Explore its wildness
  • Conserve – take personal responsibility
  • Share experiences

The wild places can be schools or centre grounds, local parks, beaches, woods, rivers or mountains.

You'll need to tell us what you're going to do to meet these challenges - find out how to get started.

How to achieve your John Muir Award in the Lake District

The Lake District National Park is an ideal place to complete your award. We are delighted to support and work with the John Muir Award in Cumbria.

When planning your John Muir Award, you can make connections with the Lake District National Park by considering:

  • Why the Lake District should be a World Heritage site.  
  • John Muir's connection with National Parks (opens in new window).
  • What you think is special about wild places in the Lake District and how this compares to what we think is special.
  • Which habitats and creatures can be found in your wild place?
  • How your Conserve activity supports the Vision for the Lake District National Park
  • Who would be interested in sharing your experiences and joining your efforts to conserve the wild places?

Watch a short film about the John Muir Award

This four minute film looks at the links between our National Parks and the John Muir Award. Set in the Lake District National Park, it captures perspectives from teachers, pupils, volunteers and Park staff.

"It doesn't cease to amaze me how children, given a chance, engage in the natural world & blossom. Those I think won’t be able to cope or engage, do. There's still hope that this generation have developed an empathy for the natural world"

Feedback from a teacher in Wigan who likes to bring his school to the Lake District.

Interested? Find out more!

How to get started.