Greetings fellow Geocachers and welcome to my first ever "edu-cache!" 
During my college's fall 2020 semester, I was tasked with writing two papers about Geocaching for my academic writing class. The first one was a simple analysis of the Geocaching discourse community based off of Swales guidelines. However, the second was much more interesting: a 3,000 word academic research paper analysing a debate or point of contention in the Geocaching community. The point of contention I chose to analyze was whether Geocaching's environmental impact was positive or negative overall. On one hand, some argue that the activity itself creates a negative human footprint on what would be otherwise remote wilderness and moreover, that geocaches themselves are a form of litter. On the other hand, many participants believe that it allows people who otherwise wouldn't venture out into nature to enjoy the many benefits of the outside world. By engaging in the activity on a regular basis, these first timers can become more exposed to the beauty and value of the outdoors while also having a negligible impact on it.
In the paper, I first analyzed relevant scholarship and discovered that the scholarship tended to be fairly evenly divided on the issue. For instance, in Breaking Out of the Traditional Lecture Hall: Geocaching as a Tool for Experiential Learning in Large Geology Service Courses (long name, I know 
), the author argues that Geocaching is a net-postive due to its potential as a learning tool for advanced education whereas in Tourist Traffic significantly Affects Microbial Communities of Sandstone Cave Sediments in the Protected Landscape Area (yet another overly long name 
), the author argues that Geocaching is a net-negative due to its potential to harm fragile ecosystems.
I then analyzed how this debate plays out in the Geocaching community (us!) itself. In my research, I noticed two main phenomenon. First, that rather than focusing on the larger overarching issue, geocachers tend to only apply this debate to particular cache instances. Second, that other smaller topics tend to get incorporated into the main topic regarding potential environmental impacts (for instance: other geocaching rules, potential land ownership issues, etc).
Park on 14th Ave NE for the shortest walk time to the cache. FTF prize is handmade earrings from local artist Anjanette Jarvis as well as many other small knick-knacks. Special thanks to my professor Stephen McElroy of Babson College for inspiring me to create this "edu-cache" and Anjanette Jarvis for donating her art for the cache.