Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium and the Omaha Public School District partnered to form the Zoo Academy, a school-within-a-zoo model that relies on the successful collaboration between an informal science education organization and a school district.
Omaha
Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium and the Omaha Public School District partnered to form the Zoo Academy, a school-within-a-zoo model that relies on the successful collaboration between an informal science education organization and a school district.
Omaha’s Henry Doorly Zoo and Aquarium has been a strong and active partner in education for over 40 years, educating 1.7 million visitors annually. The zoo has become a leader in both informal and formal education by pioneering many science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) initiatives. In 1996 the zoo moved from being a partner with others to becoming a true collaborator with a diverse group of education institutions. The zoo discovered that a successful partnership requires multiple organizations to come together and share resources for a cause. In partnering with school districts, the zoo offered expertise to help with curriculum development, teacher content-knowledge development, university course teaching, and preK–12 formal education programs. Over the years, the zoo, local school districts, and the community realized they shared common education goals and were working toward creating STEM-rich learning environments for all. This led the organizations and community to turn their partnership into a more collaborative relationship in which everyone was equally involved in creating and implementing STEM-rich education opportunities for students.
Creating the Zoo Academy
Begun as a simple, mutual-agreement partnership between the zoo and the Omaha Public School District, the Zoo Academy is a model of how to create and maintain successful collaborations between an informal science education organization and a school district. Initially, the school district provided a full-time biology teacher to teach zoology on zoo grounds and in return, the zoo provided a classroom space for the course. The institutions spent the first two years of their partnership developing trust and respect and compromising as needed to develop a shared vision and establish the roles and responsibilities of the collaboration. The zoo and school district held a common goal of developing in students the skills needed for success in zoo-related STEM career pathways. Eventually, zoo staff and administrators from two different school districts turned their partnership into a solid collaboration to create the full-day Zoo Academy, an innovative program aimed at nontraditional high school juniors and seniors. The program includes a zoo-specific curriculum, internships in zoo career fields, and opportunities to conduct scientific studies in conservation research labs.
Building Rich STEM Learning Environments
The Zoo Academy program is an effective nontraditional teaching model for science education that brings all three components of the Next Generation Science Standards (NGSS) together (NGSS Lead States 2013). Disciplinary core ideas, crosscutting concepts, and science and engineering practices are incorporated throughout the Zoo Academy curriculum and in students’ daily interactions with zoo staff. Zoo staff and teachers work together closely to ensure that the core ideas and concepts are taught by aligning curriculum with daily Zoo business and applying these concepts through lessons and work. Students are able to make connections between their classroom learning and its practical application in STEM careers when they see science and engineering concepts put into practice. For example, program participants in the veterinary science course apply science processes by learning how to hold and lift animals, listen to a heartbeat, take a temperature, and monitor blood pressure. They are asked to demonstrate and apply science practices during routine animal physicals, while the veterinarian staff gives feedback on their technique and accuracy.
As part of the program, Zoo Academy participants are constantly challenged to show their knowledge and give input on how to solve the science and engineering questions the zoo faces. For example, on a daily basis, zoo professionals are engaged in creating new and efficient ways to simulate natural habitats that will benefit the health and well-being of the animals. Zoo Academy students become actively involved in this type of work, and they are frequently asked to think of solutions for promoting natural behaviors in zoo animals. In one instance, students were asked to develop a collecting tool that could move endangered Salt Creek tiger beetle larvae into separate incubation cylinders that increase the number of beetles surviving to adulthood. Together, academy students and zoo staff used engineering practices to successfully develop a “fishing tool” and the “larvae fishing technique,” which mimicked the natural behavior of the beetle larvae and helped the larvae survive the moving process. Alongside zoo professionals, academy students applied the eight NGSS science and engineering practices by actively engaging in the research and development of the project, testing several different tools to determine the most successful moving technique. When the mature beetles were later released into the wild, the tool and technique the Zoo Academy team developed resulted in a doubling of the population of the endangered species.
The unique combination of