Sarah here. I've been in the Woodstock, Vermont area for several days, working with teachers Jennifer Stainton (Woodstock Union High School, VT) and Erica Ferland (Stevens High School in NH) and meeting with NPS staff headquartered at Marsh-Billings-Rockefeller National Park right here in Woodstock. There was broad support and excitement to get some Acadia Learning projects underway at the Park and in nearby waterbodies, and across the border in NH.

We took a hike up Mount Tom to The Pogue - a pretty pond surrounded by carriage roads, hiking trails, and a wooded landscape, thanks to the efforts of the park's three stewards, reflected in the Park's name. The Park also offers several tours of the buildings and grounds. I took a fascinating tour through the Mansion, which detailed the Park's interesting history and personalities.

We had great luck scoping out the Pogue for odonate nymphs, after a little perseverance. We found what looked like a small aeshnid, a small libellulid (my ID is fuzzier on this one), and then Erica pulled up this beauty - which appears to be an aeshnid.


Jennifer thought to put her pen in the photo for scale. What a whopper! We caught & released him/her - this was just a scoping trip not a sample collection outing, but it was great to observe the critter's movement and habitat where we netted him/her. So, things are looking great to launch a project here this fall. Stay tuned for updates...

Acadia Partners was just re-named to better reflect its partnership with the Park Service's Schoodic Education and Research Center (SERC). Acadia Partners is now the SERC Institute. Read more about it here.

Acadia Partners recently learned that it will receive $224,846 of support over the next three years from the Maine Department of Education to continue and expand Acadia Learning, its work helping students and teachers engage in research that is both educationally rich and scientifically important. The project provides training, financial aid, and logistical support to teachers as they involve their students in research activities around the state. For more information about this grant and our plans, please see the full article here.

This week, Old Town HS has presented in front of an audience of scientists at the IF&W office, and one of the Nokomis groups presented today (three more tomorrow).

So far, the poster this year are showing our intensified focus on data analysis. Box plots and correlations (X-Y plots, or scatterplots) are the key data display types. Students' graphs appear more sophisticated, and more closely aligned with their research questions, than in previous years.

Here's a sneak preview of one of my favorite graphs so far, showing that drawing it by hand can be the most effective and elegant presentation:


This poster will be presented tomorrow, along with about 15 others, at Nokomis.

Five high school teachers in Maine have been studying mercury in aquatic and terrestrial systems this academic year. They will present results of their scientific research at a series of poster sessions throughout the state of Maine. The mercury data are being compiled into a regional database that includes three National Parks and are helping scientists address questions related to the spatial variability of mercury, and to develop species that can act as indicators, helping to identify possible high-mercury sites.

See our calendar (at right) for dates and times of the presentations.

We've added some photos to our Flickr page. You can see them stream live from our page over on the bottom of the right hand column, or check them out here!

Acadia Learning has added their presence to today's popular social networks. See our links at the top of the page, or the bottom, to follow us on the web! We are now featured on Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, YouTube, and Blogspot.

Welcome to the official site launch for the Acadia Learning project. Here you will find a hub of information about us. You can see our upcoming events on the calendar on the right. Feel free to click around this and other pages here on the site to learn about the projects we are working on as well as viewing our recent news. Please visit the sites on the right of our collaborators and those who help make this project possible. Check back here for updates. Thank you!