Student and teacher seminars

A teacher demonstrating visual aids.

Last week James and I held two bird conservation seminars at the school MEBSH de Simon.  Twenty-five high school students from 4 local schools attended the Friday afternoon seminar.  Saturday afternoon, 16 primary school teachers from 9 schools came to learn about the importance of birds.  One came from a school 1 hour away.  An AUC student assisted us that day.  We gave each teacher 2 posters donated by the Audubon Society of Haiti.  Several invited us to their schools to teach their students.  Stay tuned for an upcoming post about teaching in these schools with AUC student volunteers.

MEBSH de Simon

James teaching the high schoolers.

Bird identification training with IFTA

We had our last Institution Formation en Technique Agronomie (IFTA) lecture on Monday in which I spoke about conservation.  The finale was today in which we took the class birding west of Torbeck.  Thanks to the teacher Decossard for making the arrangements, and James for translating.  I taught the students about which features to pay attention to on the birds to help them more quickly identify birds.  We also talked about the logistics of being a bird guide.  We saw only about 7 species, and it was overcast and rainy.  But it was still a great teaching experience. 

Talk at AUC Wednesday 3pm

At 3pm on Wednesday Nov. 14 ecology Professor Debbie Baker will speak about the goals of the Audubon Center.  The forum will take place in the chapel on the 3rd floor of the American University of the Caribbean in Les Cayes.  Please join us if you would like to find out more about the environmental education we can bring to your organization!

Warblers at AUC

This morning I saw 3 warbler (ti tchit) species in the same clump of trees next to the pavilion.  It was raining, so the pavilion made excellent cover.

• Black-and-white Warbler (Mniotilta varia)
• Black-throated Blue Warbler (Dendroica caerulescens) – male
• American Redstart (Setophaga ruticilla) – immature male