Outreach

In a typical year, our research center engages in several broad categories of educational outreach activity. These include guest lectures, teaching assistance, nonacademic presentations, field trips and informational educational activities. Through this activity, we reach out to KU groups, schools, and local, regional, state and national groups and institutions.  Several researchers work closely on an ongoing basis with Haskell Indian Nations University classes.



We also welcome visitors come to the KU Field Station public trails and Native Medicinal Plant Research Garden—open dawn to dusk every day throughout the year. Twice a year, we hold regular public tours at the garden and at the Field Station's Baldwin Woods Forest Preserve.



In addition, we host Friday Ecology Seminars, many open to the public, during the spring and fall semesters. The public can access our YouTube channel, where we have posted a variety of educational videos, including recordings from the Friday seminars.

In 2022 we created a new position, Education Program Coordinator for the KU Field Station, to focus on and expand outreach opportunities both within KU and with the public. This has brought about the development of new ongoing programs and has provided support for interdisciplinary collaboration with KU researchers at the Field Station.

Researchers and staff listed nearly 70 specific activities, including some ongoing programs. (Not counted here are the extensive outreach efforts of the Monarch Watch program.) Examples of outreach activities follow.

• Sara Baer, director, presented an overview of activities at our research center at KU's Mini College event. 
• Sheena Parsons, Field Station manager, served as a panelist at the Tallgrass Artist Residency open house in Matfield Green, Kansas, near the Tallgrass Prairie National Preserve.
• Peggy Schultz, researcher, led the fourth Ecosystems of Kansas Summer Institute at the KU Field Station. Schultz developed the program as an outreach component of the $20M NSF EPSCoR MAPS (Microbiomes of Aquatic, Plant and Soil Systems) program, a collaboration among five Kansas universities. The one-week institute for secondary science teachers in Kansas provides an opportunity for them to work with KU scientists to learn about current research and methods that link to K-12 science standards. Sara Baer, Debbie Baker, Jim Bever, Ted Harris, Liz Koziol, Tom McKenna, Dana Peterson,and Maggie Wagner participated as instructors.
• Jude Kastens, associate research professor, presented "From floods to fires: Imaging natural disasters for improved situational awareness” through the KU Dept. of Geography & Atmospheric Science Colloquium Series.
• Sharon Billings, senior scientist, Dean's Professor and University Distinguished Professor of EEB, by giving demonstrations of field techniques at Konza Prairie Biological Station for students in the HERS (Haskell Environmental Research Studies) program, with graduate student Annalise Guthrie (a HERS intern).  
• Ted Harris, assistant research professor, gave a virtual lecture, "Putting the pieces together: how lakes function" for a Haskell University aquatic biology undergraduate course.
• Craig Freeman, senior scientist and senior curator at KU's R.L. McGregor Herbarium, gave several tours of the herbarium to visiting groups and also gave outside presentations on its resources.
• Ben Sikes, associate scientist and associate professor of EEB, continued development of a method by which the research center can be a clearing house for Kansas citizen science data sets, starting with data from Kaw Valley Mycological Society.
• Christopher Rogers, associate research professor, gave a series of four webinars on  ticks and tickborne disease in Kansas through the KU Medical Center's Project ECHO (Extension for Community Healthcare Outcomes) webinar series.
• Eric Duell, postdoctoral researcher, spoke to Washburn University (Topeka) faculty about opportunities to work with our research center and KU through the NSF Summer REU (Research Experiences for Undergraduates) program.

Among the outreach activities taking place at the Field Station were:

• Leading middle school participants through the GreenWorks KC: ECO Careers Camp in water sampling as the Field Station's Cross Reservoir and a nature walk.
• Co-hosting, with The Nature Conservancy, a volunteer work day at the Anderson County Prairie Preserve, which is a Nature Conservancy site managed by our research center as part of the Field Station.
• Leading guided tours at the here-ing project, an earthwork created by internationally known artist Janine Antoni at the Field Station’s McColl Reserve; this is an ongoing collaboration with KU Spencer Art Museum.
• Working with the KU Environs student group on trail maintenance at the Fitch Natural History Reservation
• Hosting a leg of the Belgian Waffle Ride (bicyclists) through a portion of the Field Station.
• Hosting the Kansas Association of Biology Teachers fall conference at Armitage Education Center.