Education Program
A high-impact conservation education program will reinforce the inspirational feeling a visitor experiences after visiting the elephants at the Zoo. These elephants act as ambassadors for their wild relatives.
This program will employ a number of tools to reach people and move them to action. These tools include graphic and interactive exhibits around the elephants’ home, docents, keepers, and scientists who will talk to visitors.
- The Zoo’s elephants themselves—real live enormous elephants behaving naturally—will capture people’s attention first. Whether observing in person or via a web cam, Zoo visitors will be able to immerse themselves in our elephants’ world.
- The exhibits will relate stories about the diverse relationships among people, elephants, and habitats. They will evoke the colors, textures, and designs of the Asian cultures in which elephants belong.
- Captivating interactions with staff and interactive exhibits will reinforce the message that elephants are amazing animals—large, powerful, and remarkably intelligent creatures with intricate social lives.
- Visitors will learn what National Zoo scientists are doing to help save elephants in zoos and in the wild. Zoogoers will leave with the knowledge that elephants need their support—and the help of everyone else—to survive.
- Classes, lectures, and films will offer the general public opportunities to learn about our research and efforts to help Asian elephants survive and thrive.
- Zoo educators will extend the elephant experience to the classroom through teacher training workshops for classes that range from mathematics to biology to art. Videoconferencing and web-based technologies will extend the reach of these workshops to teachers across the country.
- A comprehensive web-based education program will help students and families learn more about Asian elephants by exploring their basic biology, natural history, and the complex issues surrounding the conservation of Asian elephants and other species living in Asian forest habitats.
- Online opportunities will offer web visitors the opportunity to see how our scientists are contributing to the conservation of Asian elephants and their habitats. Scientists will provide regular updates and insights on the Zoo website about their experiences in the field.
