Thanks to a generous grant from the Jessie Ball duPont Fund, for the past three years Lynchburg College's Claytor Nature Study Center has been offering an exciting environmental education program called OTTER: "On Target Teams for Environmental Research."
Students and teachers have been working in small groups with professional guidance, engaging in age-appropriate research tasks and interdisciplinary learning activities designed to address the Virginia Standards of Learning (SOL) for science.
To date, approximately 750 students from the City of Lynchburg and Bedford County Public Schools have had the opportunity to participate in one of our half-day OTTER field trips at the Center, during which they have been learning about environmental topics such as freshwater ecology, wetland restoration, and forest succession.
Read more about one of our OTTER experiences.
Through collaboration with the College's Center for Environmental Education and Central Virginia Governor's School, approximately 60 gifted secondary students participate in summer science-oriented activities at the Center. In addition, gifted students from Bedford County Public Schools participate in a River Discovery summer program. Home-schooled students and parents have also participated in ecology-based education programs conducted at the Center.
Environmental education is being promoted in the local schools by offering a series of intensive teacher training workshops on-site at the Center. Each summer, we have provided a two-day program that combines content and pedagogy to provide teachers with a foundation in environmental education and provide them with an orientation to how the Center can serve as a resource for their classes. To date, 48 teachers from Central Virginia have participated in one of these workshops held at the Center. These workshops were held in conjunction with Summer Institute courses sponsored by the Arthur Vining Davis Foundation.
Development of curriculum for an advanced degree in science education will begin soon. The School of Sciences and the School of Education and Human Development are studying the feasibility of a new Masters of Education with an emphasis in Science Education to enable both in-service and pre-service teachers to enhance their knowledge of the sciences and sharpen their ability to use hands-on science activities as key components of sound instruction.