When it comes to using interactive videoconference technology to connect students in K-12 classrooms with scientists and experts, Jacalyn Giacalone Willis, founding director of Professional Resources in Science and Mathematics (PRISM), the K-12 education center of Montclair State\u2019s College of Science and Mathematics, is an international innovator.<\/p>\n
Since 2003, PRISM\u2019s Rainforest Connection project has linked classrooms with researchers and educators at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama with students, teachers and experts in countries such as the United States, Australia, Belize, Costa Rica, Kenya and Thailand.<\/p>\n
Closer to home, in February 2017, Willis reports that there were 29 connections from Panama to New Jersey and three from Bridgewater, N.J., to Kenya. A total of 1,092 students in grades three through nine from eight New Jersey School Districts \u2013 including Kearney, Clifton, Galloway, Bridgewater, Orange, East Orange, Hillsdale and Paramus \u2013 participated.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Rainforest Connection project engages teachers and students in an international conversation about environmental and conservation issues. It demonstrates the interconnectedness of all lives and how we should respect one another\u2019s differences,\u201d says College of Science and Mathematics Acting Dean Lora Billings. \u201cRainforest Connection provides the first steps in forging global collaborations that can lead to sustainable solutions based on emerging technologies and new scientific discoveries.\u201d<\/p>\n
A noted naturalist, Willis visits Panama each February, where she oversees and participates in the Rainforest Connection webcasts while conducting her own research. Willis and her husband were featured in Mysteries of the Rainforest<\/em>, a Smithsonian Channel documentary that aired in late December that explored the work of scientists who regularly visit the island of Barro Colorado in the Panama Canal.<\/p>\n \u201cThe film shows how we investigate what animals are in the rainforest by using camera-traps that have collected more than 1 million photos over 22 years and by walking 100 kilometers every February since 1982 to take a trail census,\u201d she explains. \u201cWe have detailed life histories of individual animals. These long-term studies give more insights than the more common one-to-five-year studies and help guide conservation decisions.\u201d<\/p>\n In February 2017, Willis\u2019 \u201cClassrooms Without Walls\u201d project, bolstered by a University Global Education Center grant, expanded the Rainforest Connection by forging sustainable partnerships among teachers, students and scientists in New Jersey, Panama, Madagascar and Kenya.<\/p>\n This February, Willis plans to strengthen the program\u2019s link to Madagascar. \u201cAnd we will be adding friends in Bhutan,\u201d she says. Additionally, the program will be taking a fresh look at the engineering and technology components of the Panama Canal. \u201cWe\u2019ll also explore the use of camera-traps in mammal census-taking, with a comparison with New Jersey\u2019s Morris Canal. Finally, we\u2019ll offer a conservation focus on tapirs and ocelots and their conservation plight in Panama,\u201d Willis says.<\/p>\n For 15 years, Willis has worked to expand her commitment to the innovative Rainforest Connection program. \u201cIt\u2019s all about helping kids understand what scientists do and how they figure out the workings of the world around us,\u201d she explains. \u201cVery often we get feedback that children who are not interested in school \u2013 or reading, writing or science \u2013 change their attitudes when they have a chance to talk with a scientist and ask their own questions about the rainforest and the animals that live there. That attitude change is what we aim for.\u201d<\/p>\n Catalina Villasuso, an educator at Edward T. Bowser, Sr. Elementary School in East Orange, who first made a Rainforest Connection for students in grades two to five in 2007, agrees. \u201cRainforest Connection brings science to life,\u201d she says. \u201cOur students love being able to see what the scientists study and ask questions and get answers in person. After participating in the video conference, many students express the desire to become scientists themselves and travel abroad.\u201d<\/p>\n