Education

Education Briefs

Andrews LTER Inspires “lessons in ecology”

In 2003, New York City high school teacher Lyn Neeley worked with LTER scientist Kari O’Connell collecting data on understory vegetation at the Andrews Forest and assisted with wildfire research as part of the NSF-RET program. The winter of 2003-04, Neeley developed a series of PowerPoint presentations based on work by scientists at Andrews and inspired by Jon Luoma’s book The Hidden Forest. The presentations, entitled The Andrews Forest: lessons in ecology, are part of an ecology unit for 9th and 10th graders and fulfill New York standards for the Living Environment Regents examination. The presentations are available to teachers and others on the Andrews website http://www.fsl.orst.edu/lter/edu/schoolyard/modules/eco.cfm?topnav=78.

Kari O’Connell
Director, Andrews Experimental Forest

CAP’s Ecology Explorers Receives University President’s Award…

Ecology Explorers, the K-12 education program of CAP LTER, received the 2004 Arizona State University President’s Award for Innovation. This award recognizes ASU individual employees or teams for innovations that improve the educational, administrative, or other organizational processes through creative approaches. Check out our website http://caplter.asu.edu/explorers with interactive games as well as the new data analysis feature.

Students from Greenfield Elementary School at the City of Phoenix ‘s Rio Salado Project. Photo: Justin Goering

…As Explorers’ Education Team Wins $100,000 Grant

The Ecology Explorers education team of Charlene Saltz and Monica Elser along with Arizona State University colleagues received a $100,000 Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Grant to develop after-school science clubs in four low-income urban middle schools. The “Service at the Salado” program brings together ASU undergraduate students and middle-school children to develop service projects and conduct CAP LTER protocols relating to the restoration of a section of the Salt River in downtown Phoenix. Supplemental funding to continue this program for an additional semester was obtained through NSF’s EdEn Venture Fund. For more information on Service at the Salado go to http://ces.asu.edu.

Monica Elser
Education Liaison, CAP-LTER