It was a wonderful day with students at Isla Bolaña yesterday. They were able to discover the Chiriqui National Park which consists of Islands in the Pacific off Panama’s western coast. There was a small reef with a variety of fish, corals, anemones, urchins, etc that they could identify. They also were able to see evidence of the lava flow that created the landscape. What a wonderful thing for a teacher to see students having fun at the beach but still in a definite learning environment.
After returning to the Boca Brava Hotel, students opened up the bat nets for the evening, and caught some very large bats that will be processed for transport today. It is quite exciting to see them work with the professor, John Hanson. They can’t, of course handle the bats because they haven’t had their required rabies shots, but could assist with the mice and the DNA samples, etc.
In my last blog I expressed my concern that there were no programs to help fund students for these activities. Well, our CSU biologist, John Hanson came up with some sources for grants and offered to work with us on them. One student offered to make it a capstone project to learn how to write grants. Well, once more it appears that obstacles are truly only opportunities to do something greater.
It isn’t easy to “buck the system” of beaurocratic education, but we seem to be doing just that with these types of programs. Fortunately, we have a great principal as our head “Viking” and she is quite a cheerleader for thinking out of the box. We thank God for her every day.
If any of you readers know of any other endowments, bequests, or grant sources, please let us know. There are so any wonderful students in our high schools that need these programs and the world needs their passion and future expertise. Take a look at our faacebook page in a few day for the link to our fotos and testimonials of this wonderful adventure in Panama.
After returning to the Boca Brava Hotel, students opened up the bat nets for the evening, and caught some very large bats that will be processed for transport today. It is quite exciting to see them work with the professor, John Hanson. They can’t, of course handle the bats because they haven’t had their required rabies shots, but could assist with the mice and the DNA samples, etc.
In my last blog I expressed my concern that there were no programs to help fund students for these activities. Well, our CSU biologist, John Hanson came up with some sources for grants and offered to work with us on them. One student offered to make it a capstone project to learn how to write grants. Well, once more it appears that obstacles are truly only opportunities to do something greater.
It isn’t easy to “buck the system” of beaurocratic education, but we seem to be doing just that with these types of programs. Fortunately, we have a great principal as our head “Viking” and she is quite a cheerleader for thinking out of the box. We thank God for her every day.
If any of you readers know of any other endowments, bequests, or grant sources, please let us know. There are so any wonderful students in our high schools that need these programs and the world needs their passion and future expertise. Take a look at our faacebook page in a few day for the link to our fotos and testimonials of this wonderful adventure in Panama.
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