Back in college, I took a school trip to Comb Ridge in what is now Bears Ears National Monument. Until then, I thought of deserts as vast expanses of kitty litter. Backpacking across Comb Ridge changed that. I saw the vast expanses as something with intrinsic importance. From hiking among the ancestral pueblo society in this complex and vibrant ecosystem, I experienced deep personal growth.

A decade later, I returned to that same place. Again, this was with a college class. But this time I was the professor. I was able to take my personal growth and pay it forward to another generation. Some of the students who have taken our course moved on to be therapists, preschool teachers and successful entrepreneurs in our great state of Utah. And they attribute it to that class and the personal transformations they would experience on those trips. Just as my own, many years back.

One cannot quantify these experiences. But natural resources are far more than the fossil fuels that can be converted to dollars. If we let Bears Ears dissolve, we will no longer be able to protect these transformative experiences that visitors then pay forward into our society.

Justice Morath, Salt Lake City