Education and Research
Environmental Education
Partnering with local K-12 schools to experience hands-on science. This long term project integrates WSC student learning with community service.
Children's activities
Kids can participate in fossil identification, junior microscopy, soil hydrology activities, fossil reconstruction, meteor impact, insect pinning, and aquatic macroinvertebrate study.
Specimen loans
Individuals may borrow specimens for short term private or public use. Specimens available include local bird museum preps and identification cards, prairie and aquatic insect boxes, and mammal skins representing regional mammalian diversity.
Biological Monitoring
Biological monitoring can be defined as long term, repetitive, and standardized study of impact from environmental stressors on ecosystems and the determination of whether impact has led to impairment (a negative change) to the species, populations, or communities of the study ecosystems. Biological monitoring provides data for natural resource managers, conservation biologists, and stakeholders to use in managing ecosystems such as lakes, prairies, or streams.
The A. Jewell Schock Museum of Natural History sponsors, supports, or organizes biological monitoring activities in Northeast Nebraska including:
Biological Monitoring of IKES Lake: This project began on World Water Monitoring Day (September 18) 2008 with third grade students from Wayne Elementary School performing a biological assessment of the Wayne Chapter Isaak Walton League Lake. The third graders were assisted in their assessment by students from the Wayne State College Biomonitoring Class.
WSC students in Advanced Ecology: The class performed a biological assessment of South Logan Creek for the City of Wayne. The goals of this Service-Learning project were to edify students on the methods and interpretation of biological assessment and to provide a report to the City of Wayne on any possible impact from the city's wastewater effluent into South Logan Creek. The results of the study indicated that the effluent had little to no impact on the macroinvertebrate communities in South Logan Creek.