New Bedford Guide Your Guide to New Bedford and South Coast, MA
Although most of people would not want to start their day cleaning up after a tank of mussels that overflowed, Warren Gibbons, who oversees the husbandry of the Ocean Explorium’s marine life, seemed remarkably chipper despite this aggravation. Warren and his colleague Abbey Spargo, the Educational Programs Coordinator, have an infectious enthusiasm for their work at the Ocean Explorium, located in the former New Bedford Institute for Savings on the corner of Purchase and Union streets, downtown.
Most major zoos and aquariums focus on eco-tourism to bring large numbers of outsiders and herd through a maze of tanks and exhibits featuring the oddities of the natural world. While this approach can incite awe and excitement (as anyone who has been to the New England Aquarium’s penguin exhibit near a field trip can testify) rarely can they leave a meaningful impression on droves of visitors. The team of educators and scientists at the Ocean Explorium choose to go in the other direction, focusing on interaction at the group and individual level to give visitors something special to take away from their visit. As Warren puts it; “slow food, not fast food.”
Children are the main benefactors from a visit, especially those from New Bedford who have not yet had an opportunity to interact and explore the marine environment of their harbor and beaches. Through place-based learning, educators at the Explorium are able bring groups of community children directly to the waterfront. Once there, they can turn over rocks and learn that crabs, while they have big claws, are more afraid of the kids.
Back in the cavernous marble main hall, visitors are enlightened on the dangers that marine life face in modern world. This is done via’ Science on a Sphere’, which utilizes a unique three dimensional globe to display environmental issues on a global scale. After these big concepts are explained, a physical representation of at-risk creatures are displayed in the small environs in the coral reef and touch tanks provide.
The pace and level of the education is in a range where both adults and children will have an “Ah-ha!” moment as they are guided by volunteer staff. While the Ocean Explorium may not have five floors of exhibits like other, larger venues, they do make great use of the space available, giving visitors the opportunity to dive deep and ask the staff questions. According to Warren, one parting question can frequently turn into a half an hour discussion. And that’s the Explorium’s real mission: Inviting the public to explore at their own pace, with a knowledgeable staff on hand to engage and educate.
It’s the People that Make the Explorium Go
Abbey Spargo has an impressive resume in the educational field. She has worked as a science teacher at both middle and high school levels, as well as a WOW mobile educator. When she joined the organization five years ago, she brought experience in educating the public in the natural sciences, which can often look daunting to the uninitiated. This why Abbey is the perfect person to plan and coordinate not only the general public, but providing the volunteers at the Ocean Explorium with the tools they need.
The volunteers are the ones who provide a lot of the answers, and they are from all over the New Bedford community. Ages fourteen to seventeen are members of the Blue Corps, while the eighteen-plus group is known as Team Blue. Volunteers are given their own opportunity to explore the different facets of the Explorium’s operations, whether it is working as floor staff, assisting in husbandry and creature care, or getting on track to be educators.
With this outreach program, the Explorium has created a real life touch tank, allowing kids who offer their time the chance to explore career paths that might not have appealed to them otherwise. Warren and Abbey beam with a deserved pride when they talk about how the internship and volunteer participants have their confidence built over their tenure at the Explorium. On all levels the stigma towards learning is broken by their drive to open the eyes of everyone who enters the door.
If this sounds like something you want to experience firsthand, the Explorium is always looking for volunteers, especially as summer closes in. If you interested in educating yourself and your community, you can find more information here on joining Team Blue and signing up your son or daughter for Blue Corps.
A Real-Life Touch Tank
The current buzz around the Explorium is over the construction of touch tank, which features sharks and rays. The tank itself was purchased from the New England Aquarium, which recently replaced it with a larger, more permanent touch tank to meet demand.
Housing sharks and rays that are not regarded as dangerous will help to dispel the mystique of the ocean as full of great white sharks and sting rays that populate movies and television. The direct interaction with nature will really open the eyes of people who have never seen fish this big before.
Warren worked at the New England Aquarium before joining the team at the Explorium, so he has seen this tank in action. He says that the size of the facility in Boston often saw the tank overwhelmed by visitor. To his credit, Warren does a pretty spot-on impression of kid flipping his lid over the one-of-a-kind experience that is touching the coarse skin of a moving bamboo or cat shark. The focus here is provide a level of educational intimacy where the opportunity to point out that shark skin is only rough in one direction will not be lost on a throng on rambunctious fifth graders
While new tanks are coming together, Abbey tells me, the program itself is undergoing a metamorphosis. Changes to federal and state grant guidelines mean that free events have to be scaled back for the time being. The directors at the Explorium display great acumen in making up for lost grant funding by transforming the space into an event venue.
The transition began when a catering deal with Russell Morin Fine Catering was signed this January. The focus is to have the Explorium-as-a-venue in full swing by early next year. The beautiful historic space, which has thankfully been kept intact, lends itself well to wedding receptions and corporate functions as well as birthday parties. Discounts are being offered for summer and fall bookings.
In between refilling the mussel tank and taking in a delivery, Warren explained his new pet project. The general notion that most people have towards coral reefs is that they are fragile and delicate. This has been, in terms of conservation, an attempt at educating the public in the need to be careful if ever in the vicinity of these endangered animals.
It may be surprising to some, but even though it appears plant-like, the corals are actually polyps with an exoskeleton or poisonous exterior for protection. To make matter even stranger, Warren mentions that the coral in the reef tank frequently need pruning or they will overrun each other. The clippings can then be “replanted.”
The new tank will add a level of personalization that Warren tells me is not offered by other aquariums. After being educated on the coral’s ability to propagate, which allows reefs to restore themselves after an event like a hurricane ravages the seafloor, visitors will be instructed on proper pruning techniques. Then they will be given the opportunity to trim and replant their own micro-reef which will be tagged with their name in a new coral touch tank so they can check in with it whenever they want.
That is just another example of how the staff breaks down the complex systems in our vast oceans to a small nugget, tailored for each person. The Ocean Explorium offers marine education on your terms, face-to-face, and much more than a placard of information on the wall next to a fish tank. Whenever you go to the visit them, the people there seek to make every experience unique and enlightening for you.
The environment created by at the Ocean Explorium is increasingly more dependent on volunteers, especially as the hours of operation expand in the summer. If you are the type of person that would thrive in promoting the personalized educational experience at the Explorium, then volunteer. The decrease in public grants also means more of a reliance on private donation to help bring the natural wonders of New Bedford’s harbors to our community, if you can donate here. But even if you can’t find the time to volunteer or budget a donation, paying a visit to the Ocean Explorium will make you grateful towards those who did.
