Save The Bay now taking registration from K-12 teachers for its Bay Institute for Experiential Learning

PROVIDENCE, RI – Save The Bay is now taking registration for its Bay Institute for Experiential Learning. Open to K-12 teachers from across the country, the four-day Bay Institute is an innovative, hands-on professional development experience set on Rhode Island’s beautiful Narragansett Bay, an estuary of unparalleled national significance. Headquartered at the Save The Bay Center in Providence, R.I., the Bay Institute will be held 8:30 a.m. – 3:30 p.m. June 29 through July 2, and includes breakfast and lunch.

Each of the four days takes educators out on the Bay aboard Save The Bay’s marine science education vessel for a different area of study and strategies for engaging students. They will study diversity of life along the Benthic Zone through data collection, comparison of different trawl sites and live animal encounters. They’ll explore climate change and ways to introduce it to K-12 students through a close-up look at one of Rhode Island’s healthiest salt marshes with restoration ecologists from Save The Bay and the Narragansett Bay National Estuarine Reserve. And they will analyze water quality at various zones and discuss changes in water quality over time with Brown University Professor Dave Murray, and take an interactive tour of one of the nation’s most advanced wastewater treatment facilities. The institute culminates a focus on connecting each activity to teachers’ class curricula, with hands-on activities, lesson plans, ready-to-go activities and new resources.

“Ultimately, our goal is to strengthen teachers’ content knowledge and comfort level in marine science, climate science, environmental sustainability and related subjects,” said Save The Bay Education Spet Gráinne Conley.

The Bay Institute isn’t just for science teachers. Conley said past participants have incorporated their program experiences into other disciplines. For example, a history teacher used it to create an in-depth study of the how people have used the Bay from Native America to present day. An English teacher used the Bay as inspiration for poems and creative writing, and to introduce nautical-based literature to her students. “Science is everywhere, not just in a kit. And this program shows the connection between the environment and other disciplines, including math, art and literacy,” Conley said.

“People generally have a disconnect with the outdoors, and as Next Generation Science Standards promote outdoor learning, our Bay Institute gets teachers outdoors, gives them techniques for making the outdoors accessible to their students and allows them to break free from their strict day-to-day curriculum to inquiry based teaching and learning,” Conley said.

For more information about the Bay Institute for Experiential Learning, or to register, teachers may visit savebay.org/bayinstitute, or call Gráinne Conley at 401-272-3540, ext 138.

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