Triway elementary students support Bug Zoo
Jordyn Spreng, front left, and Esmae Thomas, fourth grade student leaders from Shreve Elementary School, present a check for $116.95 to the Ohio State University United Titanium Bug Zoo staff members Carrie Elvey, back left, and Jeni Filbrun.
Residents of the Ohio State University United Titanium Bug Zoo will travel more securely, thanks to Wooster Township and Shreve Elementary schools.
Student leadership teams from both schools organized a bug spirit wear and quarter donation day that collected $116.95 for a travel trunk for the zoo.
“We raised money for the (trunk) so the bugs are safe and they don’t have to be in an old suitcase,” said Esmae Thomas, a fourth grade student leader at Shreve Elementary.
She was referring to the old suitcase zookeeper and program manager Jeni Filbrun said the staff was using to transport insects. The suitcase was still compliant with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, she said, but it’s 10 years old and battered. The new travel trunk is super-secure.
“Basically, we have a new car seat for our bugs when they travel,” said Carrie Elvey, the zoo’s community outreach specialist.
It will be much safer for the insects during outreach events.
Student leaders presented Elvey and Filbrun with the money during a recent field trip to the new One Triway campus, where elementary students will start classes in the fall.
Thomas said students learned about the zoo’s needs when Filbrun and Elvey came to the school’s monthly Titan Talk assembly. The schools covered most of the cost of the travel trunk by challenging students to give quarters and dress in a color scheme of green for grasshoppers, blue for beetles, red for ladybugs, orange for the milkweed bug, yellow for bees and purple for butterflies.
Elvey praised the students for their hard work to support the bug zoo and the partnerships that have formed as a result of educational projects and class field trips to the zoo on the OSU Wooster campus.
Last year Wooster Township student leaders collaborated with the bug zoo to present Bugapalooza, an event in which students researched a bug assigned to them from the zoo and presented their findings through a show-and-tell event for the school. They used skits, slides, sketches/drawings, posters and clay models to talk about what they learned.
“Bugapalooza was probably the most rewarding school collaboration I’ve had in the 30 years I’ve been doing this work,” Elvey said. “Those students put so much thought and effort into learning about their chosen insects and how to effectively share that knowledge with their classmates, not to mention the amazing videos and posters they created as public service announcements for the bug zoo.”
The project with Wooster Township Elementary was recently designated as a Program of Excellence in Engaged Scholarship by the OSU Office of Outreach and Engagement.
The zoo staff also planned to share the Bugapalooza videos and present information about the partnership with Triway Elementary Schools during the OSU College of Food, Agricultural and Environmental Sciences Dean’s Spring Dinner.
Elvey said the repeated contact with students over the school year makes the bug zoo’s programs so much more effective and fun. Teachers and staff are strong supporters.
Elvey said the staff looks forward to working with both schools in the combined elementary.
“Community partners make the department of entomology and the United Titanium Bug Zoo stronger and our work more meaningful,” Elvey said.