ZION NATIONAL PARK — The Zion Forever Project, the official nonprofit partner of Zion National Park, Cedar Breaks and Pipe Spring National Monuments, has announced it will provide $1.5 million for 24 priority projects.

The projects, funded by leveraging public and private resources, aim to protect resources, improve the visitor experience and invest in the next generation of stewards through education.

Among the projects being funded this year are:

• Safeguarding the park’s desert bighorn sheep by monitoring and tracking their migration routes and habitat inside the park and on adjacent public lands, including field research to investigate lamb survival rates utilizing GPS collars funded by Forever Project last season.

• Constructing a new visitor education facility at Cedar Breaks to serve as base camp for the park’s nationally recognized dark sky and high alpine interpretation programs.

• Repairing and rerouting the Middle and Lower Emerald Pools trails and reopening an abandoned historic section of trail to extend visitor experience and help disperse hikers. The Middle Emerald Pools Trail closed in 2010 due to landslides.

• Designing and building a high-tech toilet facility at Scout Lookout. Bringing the greater Zion experience to every Title I school in Kane, Washington and Iron counties through in-classroom ranger visits and transportation scholarships reaching thousands of students annually.

Funding the Junior Ranger program at Zion, Cedar Breaks and Pipe Spring. Currently 40,000 Junior Rangers are certified annually.

“It is truly heartening to see how deeply people care about Zion National Park,” said Forever Project Executive Director Lyman Hafen in a statement. “The Forever Project has provided a meaningful way for everyone to make a difference for Zion this year — whether it’s $1 or $100,000. What has been accomplished goes a long way to getting Zion ready for its next 100 years.”