What It REALLY Takes To Be a Wildlife Educator
It’s like standing there naked, when the entire audience is fully clothed. That’s the best way to describe how it feels to be standing there holding an animal in front of an audience of anywhere of 20 to 300 sets of eyes. People don’t want to be judgmental, but let’s be honest, it’s human nature to make an instant decision as to whether you like someone standing up there. Are [more...]
The Science of Crowd Control
If you’re planning to host a special speaker for your school, library or community event, and you’d like a large audience turn-out, then simply invite an animal show (or the Ringling Brothers’ clowns!). These popular performers will bring in the BIG audience head count you need to impress your superiors and city officials, but they also bring another BIG potential problem: crowd control. After years of being on the receiving end of [more...]
Summer Survival at Zooniversity
Whew…summer is officially over for Zooniversity and we survived another crazy summer season! While many of you consider summer as a laid-back time to rest, relax, and lounge by the pool, summer for Zooniversity is a whirlwind of travel, shows, animal rescues, more travel and shows, feeding and cleaning, and even more travel and shows.
And, we’re certainly not complaining. We are so grateful to the 200+ librarians, school administrators and [more...]
From the Mouth of Babes – Favorites 2008
W.C. Fields warned, "Never work with animals or children." Well, I guess I deserve what I get, since I work with animals AND children. It is always a jaw-dropping moment when some wide-eyed child responds to our presenter with a totally innocent, yet always humorous, quip. This year, we decided to write them down before they were lost forever. Here are some of our favorite ‘from the mouths of [more...]
Problem Party People
Zooniversity teaches about 600 wildlife shows each year and a big hunk of them are at children’s birthday parties. Ninety-nine percent of the party parents and guests are wonderful people. They follow our safety rules, they respect our expertise as wildlife professionals, they are polite and interested audience members. But, there is that remaining one percent that we in the business label as "problem party people." They are all the [more...]
Zooniversity’s “Top” 10 Ridiculous Requests
When you deal with the general public (and mothers planning birthday parties), you just never know what you’ll hear when you answer the phone. Some of the requests have been so ridiculous, that I started writing them down a few years ago. For your enjoyment, and to borrow from David Letterman, here is Zooniversity’s “Top 10″ all time favorite, ridiculous requests:
#10 - “Do you have any storks? I thought it’d [more...]
THAT Kid from the Country Club
When you are a wildlife educator, you can do hundreds of shows each year. You can meet thousands of adults and tens-of-thousands of children each year. Year, after year, after year. The numbers can be staggering. But, there is always one show, one kid, that you vividly remember…and not for good reasons. My nightmare: THAT show at the Country Club and THAT kid.
Now, I do wildlife shows in Dallas-Fort Worth [more...]
