I am Tunicata/ Ms. R/Ms. Romney. I started teaching in Newark, NJ last fall. I am stationed at East Side High School in Newark, NJ (Ironbound section, which is just minutes off of the Path Train). I teach biology, environmental science, and earth science. Last spring semester I set up a 20g marine tank in my classroom. It was a hit! The kids loved it, I made personal donations towards it, plus had donations of goods as personal donations from 2 other reef clubs and vendors (njreefers, r**ferscafe, Aquatic Obsessions and reefcleaners.org! Great places and great people!)
This semester, now in my second year of teaching, we have some new opportunities. I unfortunately teach in 3 different classrooms which makes it near impossible to set up a tank within one class as it is then shared by 3 other teachers and consequently 75 children I do not know. But I have been granted permission to put a tank in the school's main lobby. This tank is on security camera and right in front of the security guards office.
Since this is a place of high traffic (We are also a voting center), I figured instead of a 20g tank like we had last year, I would find a bigger tank.
I found a 55g tank. It is now going on its third week running. <O:p
We have many items left over from last year but some things need to be upgraded like:
Lights, more sand, more rock, more stock, HOB skimmer, HOB fuge.
Essentially, just things for the size upgrade. The tank will be sumpless, just like last semester, and just like my personal tank at home and many tanks on this board.
I am trying to get in talks with my supervisors to see if there are any concrete funds available from the school, and also if they would give us permission to fundraise (we are not a club, I don't think they even looked at my proposal for one..., but I have teaching and now going to grad school, so I'm ok with just doing it during my classes).
But the students are excited. We're using the coralidea link, some marine husbandry books, and slides from my tank build, as well as visiting websites such as MR to see and learn about our potential critters. The students are linking the tank to marine sustainability issues, learning basic chemistry, biology, and of course how to set up and maintain this particular type of marine tank. During the semester as the children learn more, they will be responsible for doing presentations to other classes. Our goals are educational for ourselves and our community.
We are more than open for having members come to the school to do presentations. We also are open to field trips (months in advance).
If you have something you would like to give, please check out our wishlist. Items not on this list can be considered. Please remember we will be sumpless, this is a 55g tank, we prefer to keep it a softy and low need LPS tank. We can feed frozen and flake food. We are harvesting pods (within main tank as well) and brine shrimp in the old 20g tank. <O:p
This semester, now in my second year of teaching, we have some new opportunities. I unfortunately teach in 3 different classrooms which makes it near impossible to set up a tank within one class as it is then shared by 3 other teachers and consequently 75 children I do not know. But I have been granted permission to put a tank in the school's main lobby. This tank is on security camera and right in front of the security guards office.
Since this is a place of high traffic (We are also a voting center), I figured instead of a 20g tank like we had last year, I would find a bigger tank.
I found a 55g tank. It is now going on its third week running. <O:p
We have many items left over from last year but some things need to be upgraded like:
Lights, more sand, more rock, more stock, HOB skimmer, HOB fuge.
Essentially, just things for the size upgrade. The tank will be sumpless, just like last semester, and just like my personal tank at home and many tanks on this board.
I am trying to get in talks with my supervisors to see if there are any concrete funds available from the school, and also if they would give us permission to fundraise (we are not a club, I don't think they even looked at my proposal for one..., but I have teaching and now going to grad school, so I'm ok with just doing it during my classes).
But the students are excited. We're using the coralidea link, some marine husbandry books, and slides from my tank build, as well as visiting websites such as MR to see and learn about our potential critters. The students are linking the tank to marine sustainability issues, learning basic chemistry, biology, and of course how to set up and maintain this particular type of marine tank. During the semester as the children learn more, they will be responsible for doing presentations to other classes. Our goals are educational for ourselves and our community.
We are more than open for having members come to the school to do presentations. We also are open to field trips (months in advance).
If you have something you would like to give, please check out our wishlist. Items not on this list can be considered. Please remember we will be sumpless, this is a 55g tank, we prefer to keep it a softy and low need LPS tank. We can feed frozen and flake food. We are harvesting pods (within main tank as well) and brine shrimp in the old 20g tank. <O:p
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