Are you a science educator? Then join us for VCE’s Community Science Teacher Education Workshop!
In this four-day program, you’ll engage in inquiry-based exercises that incorporate both data collection and analysis, gain confidence incorporating field methods into your curriculum, work with open-access data, discuss both planning and conducting community science, and receive a primer on the ecology of Connecticut River’s Upper Valley.
You’ll also learn ways in which your classes and students can contribute to VCE’s community science initiatives.
Thanks to our funders, the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation Wellborn Ecology Fund and Hypertherm’s Hope Foundation, we will be able to provide a $150 stipend to participants. Continuing education credits are also available for participants of this workshop. Participation is limited to 12 educators on a first come first served basis.
For more information contact Ryan Rebozo at rrebozo@vtecostudies.org.
Review our 2026 agenda here.
Register for VCE’s Community Science Teacher Education Workshop
Meet the Workshop Facilitators
Ron Smith is a science educator, naturalist and community science project leader from Merchantville, NJ. With over 25 years of Project, Place and Problem Based Learning experience, Ron leads Community Science adventures for children and adults alike. Collaborating with various conservation organizations and scientists from universities and state agencies, Ron has initiated community science projects ranging from Horseshoe Crab Rescues to Frog Surveys.
With Pinelands Preservation Alliance, Ron established the Life Science Field Training Institute, a week-long program that trains teachers on field study techniques. Ron is thrilled to partner with Dr. Ryan Rebozo and VCE to bring this community science workshop to Vermont and share field experiences and program building with educators from New England (a place near and dear to his heart).
Adventures in Community Science is a How To Guide for establishing community science projects in schools, nature centers and neighborhoods. Describing sample projects and offering lessons that come from community science investigations, a companion workbook offers interdisciplinary activities.
Adventures in Backyard Gardening is an invitation to get kids engaged in growing food, studying backyard ecology and making decisions to support biodiversity in their backyards. A diversity of projects and food can be found in the chapters and each section offers activities that can enhance the outdoor adventures.
When not in the field chasing frogs, counting shorebirds or searching for freshwater mussels, Ron enjoys hiking, gardening, playing the fiddle and sharing all adventures with his wife, Lisa and their two children Lily and Gabriel.
Ryan Rebozo is an ecologist whose interests include disturbance ecology, plant-insect interactions, mycology, and rare plant demography. He joined VCE in 2021 after serving as the Director of Conservation Science for the Pinelands Preservation Alliance in New Jersey. He completed his PhD at Drexel University in 2015 and received his BS in ecology from Rutgers University in 2010. He has experience teaching at Jefferson and Stockton Universities as well as leading field based teacher education workshops for Princeton Universities QUEST program. Ryan has worked with Ron Smith on the Pinelands Preservation Alliance’s Life Science Field Training Institute.
Ryan lives in Bradford, Vermont where he enjoys hiking in the mountains and exploring his new home state.
