Vol. 1, No. 2
Headline Back Issues
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Docent program brings the ocean to the classroom, and the classroom to the ocean Durham, New Hampshire -- "This is certainly more nature-oriented, more in the outdoors, something I never had time for before," said volunteer Bob Merriman, as he stood on a floating dock preparing to dip a sediment sampling instrument into the water. Merriman was learning to use a secchi disk as part of his training for the University of New Hampshire Sea Grant and Extension's Marine Docent Program. He'd soon be explaining the instrument to school children aboard the program's floating lab, the Lady Merrilee Ann, a party-fishing boat from Seabrook. A retiree who joined the program last October, Merriman said it gives him a chance to help others, especially children, "learn about where they live." The Marine Docent Program was launched in 1978 with eight volunteers who led groups on tours of the university's newly built Jackson Estuarine Laboratory on Adams Point. The program has since grown to include more than 100 participants, and encompasses comprehensive education about the marine environment, according to Sharon Meeker, coordinator for New Hampshire Sea Grant Marine Education Program and winner of a 1996 Visionary Award from the Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine Environment. Partially funded with donations from private and corporate supporters and from the volunteers themselves, the docent program enables the Marine Education Program to reach out to more than 10,000 people a year, despite the fact that Meeker is its only full-time staff person, she explained. "New Hampshire has the shortest coastline, but one of the most active marine education programs in the US," Meeker stated. "We have everything here in 18 miles that you have all around the Gulf of Maine," including estuaries, sand dunes, rocky shores, sandy beaches, pebble beaches, and other features, she said. Mostly, docents work with school-aged children, bringing presentations and activities about the marine environment and the Gulf of Maine into the classroom and serving as a valuable resource for teachers. Other volunteer activities currently under way include helping the NH Office of State Planning with a sanitary survey. Many of the docents are retirees. Others include home-school students, mothers, and a few college students, although most can't make the two-year commitment the program requires. And it's no wonder that Meeker encourages a long-term association, given the time invested by the program and the docents themselves in training for their outreach role. Training comprises five months of twice-weekly three-hour sessions that include instruction in the field and the lab. Toward the end of that phase, volunteers choose an area in which to specialize and begin participating in related activities. Long-term involvement seems to agree with the volunteers, though. Meeker said more than half of the current roster are five-year veterans, and some have participated for a decade or more. |
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Gulf of Maine Council on the Marine