ACFF board member Larry Cumbo, left, listens as filmmakers Nick Tucker and Grace Eggleston talk about the making of their short film, “Timber Rattlesnakes of Catoctin Mountain Park,” in the Frank Arts Center Theater on Thursday. Tabitha Johnston

SHEPHERDSTOWN — The Appalachian Conservation Film Festival (ACFF) welcomed over a hundred students from three different local schools to its first Student Day in the Frank Arts Center on Thursday.

According to festival director Hilary Lo, Student Day has been a plan long in the works.

“This is our first year holding a Student Day. We’ve always wanted to do it,” Lo said. “We have a science teacher now on our board, who has just retired, and she was very eager to make sure we engaged public school students.”

According to ACFF board vice president Carolyn Thomas, 35 filmmaking students in their junior and senior years from Frederick County Career And Technology Center attended Student Day, along with a number of students from Jefferson High School and 85 students from Shepherdstown Middle School.

“Hopefully, the students will be really energized to learn more about the festival!” said ACFF board president Dennis Liu.

Students from Frederick County Career And Technology Center wait in line for coffee and cookies, prior to the start of the film screening in the Frank Arts Center Theater on Thursday. Tabitha Johnston

Liu and ACFF board member Larry Cumbo, who is an Emmy-nominated filmmaker, led the film screening and discussion for the high school students in the Frank Arts Center Theater. Over the two hour screening, the students watched four short films, including: “Wild Hope: Unleaded”; “Reviving the Forgotten River,” which was the Student Film Award winner; “The Tragedy of the Apple Tree,” which was made by 16-year-old Frederick County Career And Technology Center student Luis Rosa Villanueva; and “Timber Rattlesnakes of Catoctin Mountain Park,” which featured now-deceased Shepherdstown resident and eastern timber rattlesnake expert Marty Martin.

“We went out three or four times to film the snakes, for this project,” said “Timber Rattlesnakes of Catoctin Mountain Park” cameraman Nick Tucker. “It was really tough, keeping up with Marty Martin. He was really fast and a super tenacious guy — really fun to work with.”

It was filmed in 2021 — a year before Martin’s passing from complications due to a snake bite, according to film director Grace Eggleston.

“We wouldn’t have found any snakes at all for the film, if we weren’t with Marty,” Eggleston said, noting the film has been dedicated to Martin’s memory. “He had been wandering the Appalachians for 60 years. He knew every rock and tree stump out there. He knew where the dens were, where they would breed and where they would migrate and have their babies. We learned a lot from him, in a couple of days.”

With the group of middle school students being particularly large, it was split up by grade for film screenings in Shipley Recital Hall and McCoy Rehearsal Hall. Both groups saw a number of short films, including: “Wild Hope: Unleaded,” “Polar Bear Country,” and “Timber Rattlesnakes of Catoctin Mountain Park” and a film about beavers’ impact on the ecosystem. Potomac Valley Audubon Society (PVAS) environmental educator Holly French, who is an AmeriCorps member, participated in a film discussion with the sixth grade students about the film on beavers.

“We’re talking about the importance of beavers with the students,” French said, mentioning a couple of PVAS’s preserves have beavers. “Afterwards, we’re kind of roleplaying being the different stakeholders, to help the students understand all of the many aspects involved with beavers’ position in our world — are they good for the environment or are they bad. We want to help them think, in terms of conservation and how they should interact with wildlife.”

Student Day was made possible by the West Virginia Film Office, HHMI Tangled Bank Studios and American University’s Center for Environmental Filmmaking.