Building Connections

Building Connections

A Vision for the Future of Education at The Living Desert

DR. ANNA YOUNG, DIRECTOR OF EDUCATION ENGAGEMENT

When I attended the Association of Zoos and Aquariums (AZA) conference in April, a phrase I heard repeatedly was, “We were doing XYZ … and then COVID happened.” I’m sure that’s a familiar phrase for many of us here as well.

As The Living Desert’s new Director of Education Engagement, I am fortunate to begin my role in a (mostly) post-social distancing world. As we look to rebuild our educational offerings, I have been thinking about the future of education from a 30,000-foot vantage point. Like so many of our AZA peers, education programming and offerings were put on hold for most of the last two years. I’m eager to create new programming, but I also realize how important it is to take time to learn about The Living Desert and Coachella Valley so I can be intentional about what we bring back, and what we leave behind from before the pandemic.

We need to ensure that our participants are engaged and actively gaining hands-on experiences.

From my perspective, zoo education is first and foremost about conservation education, and conservation education is about behavior change. Psychologists have coined the term the ‘GI Joe fallacy’ to refer to when people mistakenly assume that knowledge is half the battle. We so often wish that once someone learns about the thing we care about, they’ll care about it too, but psychology has taught us that it takes more than awareness to inspire change. As a scientist, I prefer to take an evidence-based approach to all matters, including teaching and learning, which aligns perfectly with The Living Desert’s goal of being a data-driven nonprofit. If we venture into education the same way we would a science project—experiment with several new ideas and evaluate the results—that means in the coming months we’ll be testing various kinds of programming, and some of those ideas will continue, while others are phased out.

I plan to expand our education programming in a way that is asset-based: teaching people positive impact behaviors (what to do instead of what not to do), uniting them within a community to inspire change, and empowering guests with a sense of agency to act for conservation. We’re also working alongside our Conservation team to create programming and engagement opportunities that build future agents of conservation.

The best programming is cocreated with, not for, communities, by meeting people where they are—literally, during neighborhood outreach events, or at the zoo by addressing a family’s needs while they are visiting. We’ve started making small changes towards this by expanding our ZooCamp summer check-in hours to encompass wrap-around care, such that parents who work at 8am can drop their kids off at ZooCamp and still make it to work on time. Our newly expanded Education team now has four bilingual staff members who can present programming in Spanish to increase inclusion and accessibility.

In a world of Google and computers in our pockets, innovative education isn’t about spouting facts as much as making meaningful connections. These connections can still occur virtually to reach audiences who wouldn’t be able to make it to The Living Desert, but they should rely on education through storytelling—not only is storytelling more engaging, but research also shows that people are more likely to retain stories than crumbs of information off the block of knowledge. Above all, education should be learner-centered. This means it doesn’t matter how active, enthusiastic, or excited our educators are, we need to ensure that our participants are engaged and actively gaining hands-on experiences. This is already at the center of our ZooCamp programs and will be a useful lens for us to use to evaluate all our potential future programming.

Zoo education plays a part in people’s development throughout life, from early childhood education to K-12 classes, to adult programs and volunteering after retirement.

Zoo education also plays a part in people’s development throughout life, from early childhood education to teacher support of Next Generation Science Standards, family programs and STEM career preparation for teen volunteers, as well as adult programs and volunteering after retirement. I am excited to try out new adult programming such as book clubs and mystery-themed events that center around animals and STEM practices—imagine learning about how conservationists use eDNA to detect species presence while enjoying wine and solving a Zoo Scene Investigation!

Ultimately what zoo education uniquely has to offer is the joy and wonder of watching wildlife and internalizing knowledge from head to heart, and this will be at the center of how we connect people and share stories.