Salmon science: fish a part of elementary school curriculum

MAT-SU — These third-graders are being primed for adulthood by learning how to become stewards of salmon in the Mat-Su Valley.

“It doesn’t take much to kill a salmon egg,” Craig Baer reminded a gaggle of Mat-Su elementary school students on Wednesday.

Baer, retired from the Alaska Department of Fish and Game, paired up with his son and current Fish and Game employee, Adrian, Sept. 24 to test the knowledge of Snowshoe, Butte, and Swanson Elementary School students as part of the year-round “Salmon in the Classroom” program.

According to the department website, thousands of Alaskan students take a field trip around this time every year to gather salmon eggs from local rivers and creeks, nurture them into fry throughout the year, and release them in the spring.

“Through participation in the project, students learn about the life cycle and biology of Pacific salmon species, their habitat requirements, responsible angling techniques for catching them, and ways to protect Alaska’s valuable wild salmon stocks for future generations,” the website reads.

Mat-Su Fish and Game employee Samantha Oslund said that 16 schools are participating in the program this year, educating approximately 940 students.

This is the first time in three years, however, that Butte Elementary has been able to take a hands-on approach to salmon education, third-grade teacher Dwight Homstad said.

“(Fish and Game) didn’t have as much money to put into the education program, (so) they would just bring us the eggs,” he said. “It’s not as good as the kids being able to go out and do the harvest.”

Oslund explained via e-mail that the lack of money came from a decreased sales of fishing gear nationwide, which fund sport fish programs “here at home” directly.

“As ADF&G is faced with fiscal challenges, we evaluate and prioritize which programs best meets the department’s obligation to manage Alaska’s fisheries resources,” Oslund wrote. “ADF&G realizes the value of educating young Alaskans on salmon life history and fish anatomy with hands-on experiences to promote stewardship of Alaska’s fishery resources. Many students caught their first fish while participating in (an ADF&G Division of) Sport Fish-sponsored ice-fishing event. As important as they are, these education programs don’t impact the department’s ability to manage the resource as directly as many research and management projects.”

Oslund said their year-round fishery biologist position has been downsized to run the Salmon in the Classroom program for just 1.5 months, “due to constraints.”

The elder Baer estimated 1,000 students attended the egg take at Rabbit Slough off the Glenn Highway over the course of two days last week. That was more than expected, but it was only half the number of students from previous years, and, Oslund said, the event used to last a week. Fish and Game staff would facilitate dissections, life cycle and watershed presentations, ice-fishing trips, fly tying, and an end-of-year festival during which the students would release their fish into Matanuska Lake.

“We are still able to facilitate the raising of fish in the classroom, but only because of fish tanks and other equipment left over from the original larger project,” Oslund said. “With the funding we do have, we are still making an impact in the school district, but at a reduced level. The mission of the Division of Sport Fish is to protect and improve the state’s recreational fisheries resource, and a major portion of the educational program through sport fisheries is fostering an informed public.”

“Informed” doesn’t just mean that elementary school students can yell out “adipose” when their teacher points to the little nub in front of the tail fin, or “coho” when Adrian Baer pulls a big red salmon out of the water, as occurred last Wednesday.

(Nor was it reflected in the collective “ew” sounded by the youngsters as they watched one Baer gulp down a mouthful of fish eggs and the other kiss the back of a recently alive salmon.)

“If you look at it, salmon’s a big part of our economy in the Alaska, a big part of who we are,” Homstad said. “It’s great for these guys to understand the importance of (salmon) and the need to manage that resource.”

At Butte Elementary, Homstad and his students work together to figure out survival and mortality rates of the salmon, monitor water quality and temperature in the 125-gallon tank, and keep records of everything related to their fish.

But Homstad said he works as more of a guide and lets the kids perform most of the necessary duties themselves. After all, if they don’t, the school could lose their permit to continue with the program.

“In order to keep the permit, they gotta do this, and the only reason they can do this is because of the third-graders last year,” Homstad said. “Responsibility is put on them to keep it moving.”

Keeping track of all those numbers and making sure the temperature in the tank doesn’t rise to a deadly 12 degrees Celsius might seem overly ambitious for a third-grader to some, but Homstad said the program is “just spot on for what they should be doing.”

“When they have enough guidance and support, they can do a lot,” he said. “I’d rather shoot high and give them the support that they need to get there than try to shoot too low and, not bore them necessarily, but I want them to be challenged in here.”

Homstad said that the program falls not only in the math and science departments but is also strong in language arts as the students keep journals of their salmon-related observations.

For more information on Salmon in the Classroom, click the “Education” tab on the Fish and Game website, or visit 1.usa.gov/1vkPWjg.

Contact Caitlin Skvorc at 352-2266 or caitlin.skvorc@frontiersman.com.