Enthusiastic About the Amazon, Worlds Apart

April 22, 2007

These kids are separated by 6,097 km, but they’re pulling together. This spring in Longmeadow, Massachusetts, at Lubavitcher Yeshiva Academy’s annual education fair, three 6th grade students raised money for ACA with a display on Amazon conservation. At the same time, schoolchildren from the small town of Boca Amigos were visiting ACA’s field station in Amazonian Peru, doing field work side by side with resident researchers.

The visit was part of our Science Saturday program, which every week brings together the researchers who’ve traveled thousands of kilometers to work at Los Amigos and the children who’ve lived there their whole lives. In one recent outing, Peruvian grad student Ursula Valdez and Colombian grad student Paulo Pulgarín showed the children how they capture birds in mist nets, measure and tag them, and then release them. More recently, Colombian grad student Adriana Guzmán and US grad student Jenny Jacobs led a how-to workshop on insect collections in the children’s community.

Thanks to our three allies at Lubavitcher Yeshiva Academy and to all who teach for, learn at, and get excited about the Science Saturdays.