BANGOR — As a result of the State Envirothon held on May 30 at Viles Arboretum in Augusta, Mt. Ararat High School in Topsham placed first in this Maine competition.

The Maine Association of Conservation Districts awarded the three top-scoring high school Envirothon teams at the event. The second and third place winning teams respectively were: Spruce Mountain High School in Jay and Dirigo High School in Dixfield. Eleven teams from around the state competed.

Envirothon, Maine’s largest high school environmental education program, is an international program representing over 500,000 high school students in the United States and Canada. Usually the first place team represents Maine in the National North American Envirothon, but due to some organizational changes, there will not be a national event this year. However, the winning team, Mt. Ararat, was awarded a three-day rafting and outdoor adventure in part donated by Adventure Bound from Caratunk.

The major objective of the Maine Envirothon, an effective educational tool capable of supplementing environmental education both inside and outside the classroom, is to provide opportunities for high school students or organized groups of high school-aged students to acquire and increase their outdoor skills and scientific knowledge about Maine’s natural resources so that they can make informed, educated decisions about the environment.

It provides students with reference materials, workshops and hands-on, outdoor, real-life experiences in five areas including forestry, wildlife, soils, aquatics and a current issue — this year being sustainable agriculture/locally grown.

Other high schools competing in the finals included Bonny Eagle, Brunswick, Bucksport, Hampden, Hodgdon, Maine School of Science and Math, Washington Academy and Wisdom. These teams represented the top scorers from four regional competitions held around the state earlier in May, at which 61 teams representing 32 high schools participated statewide.

At the closing ceremony it was announced that Cory Ridley from Spruce Mountain High School received a $2,000 scholarship from the College of Natural Sciences, Forestry and Agriculture at the University of Maine at Orono.

For more information, visit maineenvirothon.org, www.envirothon.org or Maine Envirothon on Facebook.