Meet Your Community:
Pam Bunch
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Bunch might say she has found her place in nature. As Coordinator
of the Stubnitz Environmental Education Center (see inset) in Lenawee
County, Pam coordinates a variety of educational opportunities for
students and the general public. “I am a certified teacher and
taught in schools and I love nature and the outdoors. This is the
perfect place to do both,” says Bunch.
Programs for students focus mainly on field trips to the Center that
include activities, a discussion, and a hands-on investigation of
the natural world both in the indoor lab at the Center and on the
400-acres surrounding the Center. The three and a half hour program
culminates in a 45-minute nature hike around the grounds. Trips focus
on different themes depending on the grade in question, starting with
“Nature Around Us” for Kindergarteners to “Orienteering
and Field Ecology” for sixth graders to “Exploring Ecology”
for high school students.
Over the last five years Pam has also run a program called Our Nature
that attempts to draw in high school students who are not in science
courses. This art competition asks students to create their interpretation
of something in nature. The top two pieces received are then purchased
and displayed in a gallery at the Center.
Another way Pam attempts to reach out is through a variety of community
education programs. These are held four to five times a year, and
have a range of topics. This year’s selection includes a live
animal presentation at the Center that will give participants a chance
to view and better understand some of Michigan’s wildlife, a
course on dried wreath making, and a spring wildflower and songbird
guided hike.
As Pam sees it, the “Center is a conduit for an experience and
connection with nature and other like-minded folks. It’s a place
to learn more and to gather, and have an exchange of ideas about the
environment, education, and preservation.”
Pam came to the Stubnitz Center in 1995, and feels it is a perfect
fit for her. “My first task was to create programs that would
bring students here. I had training in environmental education curricula,
and felt strongly it could be integrated because it is about our world,
our place in it, and relationships,” said Pam. She then set about
designing the field trip plans used today to guide students and their
teachers through an adventure in Nature.
“Often for students and the adults who chaperone them, this
is their first exposure to this stuff, such as a groundwater model
or amphibians. They gain some content knowledge and appreciate nature
and its relationships. They begin caring about it and wanting to preserve
it,” said Pam.
Pam also feels her work has the potential to move people a step further.
She hopes their time at the Center will affect their daily life and
decisions. “They begin to have the knowledge needed to make choices
and decisions to move toward preservation and away from destruction.
I know it is a large expectation, one contact won’t do it, but
I hope to add to their bank of experience to affect change in their
behavior and choices.”
For more information on visiting the Stubnitz Environmental Education
Center or finding out how to get more involved you can call Pam Bunch
at 517-265-6691.
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