At its heart, the Ambler Arboretum of Temple University is about connections. From connecting visitors to the natural world to connecting students to new information that will help them in their careers to connecting researchers with resources to make fascinating new discoveries or advancements, the Arboretum is a focal point for helping people build a deeper connection with and understanding of the world around them.

The tremendous resources the Ambler Arboretum provides to Temple University, the region and well beyond were recently recognized with a special global accreditation.

The Ambler Arboretum of Temple University has been awarded Level III Accreditation by the ArbNet Arboretum Accreditation Program and the Morton Arboretum for "achieving particular standards of professional practices deemed important for arboreta and botanic gardens."

"Arbnet was started by the Morton Arboretum as a way to provide a formal set of criteria for places to call themselves an arboretum," said Kathy Salisbury, Director of the Ambler Arboretum. "Before the accreditation process was developed, you could just have a collection of trees and promote it as an arboretum or public botanical garden — there really was no criteria, so the places were much different in scope, quality and mission. The Arbnet Arboretum Accreditation Program provides an industry-recognized standard for self-evaluation and documentation to achieve different levels of accreditation."

According to the organization, the ArbNet Arboretum Accreditation Program, sponsored and coordinated by the Morton Arboretum in cooperation with the American Public Gardens Association and Botanic Gardens Conservation International, is the only global initiative to officially recognize arboreta at various levels of development and capacity based on a set of professional standards. The program "fosters professionalism of arboreta worldwide; enables collaboration in scientific, collections, and conservation activities; and advances the planting, study, and conservation of trees."

The Ambler Arboretum is now additionally recognized as an accredited arboretum in the Morton Register of Arboreta, a database of the world's arboreta and gardens dedicated to woody plants.

According to Salisbury, there are four levels of accreditation in the ArbNet Program. Each level of accreditation requires arboreta to meet an extensive list of criteria.

"We achieved a Level III Accreditation, which we're really excited about," she said. "Out of 742 accredited arboreta, there are only 48 that meet the requirements for Level III accreditation and there are only 45 that are at Level IV. It recognizes our professionalism, our capacity and the types of programming we offer."

To be awarded Level III Accreditation, "we had to have an ongoing plan for the Arboretum," said Salisbury.

"We are in the process of working through our the of our five-year plan, which runs through 2028. One of the primary goals was to achieve this accreditation," she said. "I think an important thing to note is we were ready to send in our accreditation application prior to the 2021 tornado that hit campus — I was waiting for one more piece of information on the day the tornado hit. Of course, after that, we had to reevaluate, reconfigure and start again, which we dedicated ourselves to doing."

Anne Brennan, Plant Records Curator for the Ambler Arboretum, was essential to that task, Salisbury said.

"Anne worked extremely hard to gather all the information we needed and submitted the application," she said. "Anne who also manages our database and the public facing Arboretum Explorer." 

Level III Accreditation also requires arboreta to have an organizational or governance group, "which we have in the Arboretum Advisory Committee," Salisbury said.

"For Level III, you also have to have more than 500 different types of plants labeled and accessioned," she said. "You have to have paid staff and volunteer support and a paid curator as well for Level III."

ArbNet Level III Accreditation also requires "a public dimension," Salisbury said.

"You must provide public access to at least one event per year and regular public access to the gardens. You need to have enhanced public educational programming," she said. "It goes beyond just the basics. The Ambler Arboretum, being part of a college campus, provides substantial educational programming — the gardens and grounds are used extensively to support courses offered at Temple Ambler."

According to Salisbury, in addition to being an essential resource for regional residents and organizations, the Arboretum also shares extensive data globally.

"We take our inventory, and we share it with Botanic Gardens Conservation International, which then makes it available to public gardens throughout the world," she said. "Temple faculty and researchers are also involved in ongoing tree science and plant and conservation activities."

Universities, and university programs, regularly go through accreditation processes "that show that they meet professional criteria that is accepted across the industry," said Salisbury.

"This process through ArbNet has given Temple another great addition to the University's long list of accredited facilities. We have this accredited outdoor classroom space for not only our horticulture and landscape architecture majors, but any major that can make use of it," she said. "It's also important to us within the community of public gardens. It's a way of showing our community what we have achieved at this high level."

According to Salisbury, the ArbNet accreditation "didn't really have a great deal to do with rebuilding from the tornado and planting about 800 new trees."

"This accreditation has to do with the fact that we've expanded our programming, our research and our access," she said. "Big picture for the Arboretum, we want to be a comprehensive and high-quality teaching and research garden, an exemplary sustainable landscape educating and inspiring students, community residents, university, corporate and municipal officials in environmental and environmentally responsible methods and materials. We want to meet or exceed Temple University's sustainable goals while maintaining a diverse and well documented plant collection useful to researchers and faculty from around the region and the globe."

The Ambler Arboretum, Salisbury said, "is a workplace, educational space and community resource that values and reflects the diversity of people, animals and plants."

"The Arboretum is a valuable environmental, educational and research resource integral to the University and the surrounding community. It is an historic treasure unique among public gardens, with interesting, important stories to share, lessons to teach and connections to make," she said. "Gaining accreditation, I hope, continues to elevate the presence of the Arboretum within the University itself."

There are so many opportunities "in these gardens for University departments to take advantage of," Salisbury said.

"If you want to study Greek or Latin in the real world, study our plant names. For artists or sculptors, come here for inspiration, for exhibition or just to create," she said. "There are opportunities for student organizations to come here for team building, to hold meetings or just discover beauty and take a moment to breathe. The Arboretum is 187-acres open to the public from sunrise to sunset — we are a space for everyone for education, recreation, inspiration and investigation."