Wilcox County 8th-graders identify bones using a human skeleton and bone charts while AU graduate assistant, Cameron Gill looks on.

The Auburn University Environmental Institute’s (AUEI) Black Belt Environmental Science and Arts Program (BBESAP) reaches out to underserved youth in the Black Belt region of Alabama. BBESAP is an off-campus environmental education project designed to increase the appreciation, knowledge and conservation of natural resources by the region’s students, and teachers. The program targets students (grades 5-8) in the Black Belt region and provides special outdoor classroom field days offering educational opportunities and career development exposure in a non-traditional setting.

Merritt Elementary students observe while USGS hydrologist, Will Mooty empties macro-invertebrates from a seine into examination pans.

The program format is designed to stimulate academic achievement in science and the arts. The program is intended to complement and enhance the classroom curriculum in science by conducting hands-on environmental science modules. The environmental education efforts are further enhanced through a literary and visual art module that incorporates aspects of the River of Words (ROW) Environmental Art and Poetry program, administered in Alabama by the Auburn University Center for the Arts and Humanities (AUCAH), AUEI and Auburn University Libraries. ROW is a national environmental art and poetry contest created to promote watershed/natural resources awareness, literacy and the arts among our nation’s youth. Students from previous field days have won recognition at the state level of the ROW competition.

D.C. Wolfe Elementary students learn to take nature photos during a BBESAP field day.

Since spring 2005, forty-eight field days and programs were conducted and over 2,390 students from eight different Bullock, Wilcox and Macon County Schools attended. Examples of science modules included tree identification, trail walks, reptiles and amphibians comparison, pond ecology, hydrology characteristics, and herb gardening. Art-related modules included nature photography, farm life depiction, haiku poetry and nature journals. More detailed descriptions and photos are found on the module page.

John Owens, AU Dept of Agronomy and Soils, briefs D.C. Wolfe Elementary students on soils analysis methods.

Spring 2008 included eight field days in three counties, two programs featuring the raptors from AU's Southeastern Raptor Center and an Earth Week Assembly in Macon County featuring Donny Addison, AU recycling coordinator, and Kay Stone. The raptor programs were held at Merritt Elementary in Midway and D.C. Wolfe Elementary in Shorter. Students from grades K-6 attended and learned about the importance roles birds of prey have in the balance of nature.

Enhancing the 6th-grade earth science curriculum, the program offered Alabama geology with an emphasis on paleontology for the first time. Graduate students from AU's Geology Department led modules on the importance of fossils in scientific study, how they form as well as allowing students to find, identify and keep a variety of fossils.