Bringing my Passion to the Classroom

    As many of you know, I am an avid outdoors person and enjoy hunting and fishing in the great state of PA. It has been a family tradition for generations and I am so happy to be carrying it on. I am also proud to be a female leader in the outdoor industry. Every October and November, you can find me in a tree stand chasing the great PA white-tail. I even had a personal record of shooting a buck every year in archery season for 10 years straight. If you do the math, I started hunting at the age of 9 and I am currently 21. So, the last two years that I have lived in State College, I have been unsuccessful in archery season. I have been able to harvest a doe in rifle season each year, but have been without a buck since 2020. No matter the size of the Trophy, I am ecstatic with every harvest!

With pursuing a job in Agriculture Education, we have flexibility in what we can teach in the classroom. I was fortunate to have an agriculture teacher with the same understanding of wildlife conservation. I thoroughly enjoyed his class when he taught about wildlife or forestry. I think it is important to teach this in the classroom, because everything we do has an effect on the environment and species around us. By teaching this in our classrooms, we can connect with those students who are passionate about hunting and fishing.

So, many of you may be thinking, what is the point of me writing this blog? Well, as my passion for teaching others about agriculture and my passion for hunting and conservation grows, I have decided to merge the two! I am in the process of becoming a certified Hunter and Trapper Education Instructor with the PA Game Commission. I am beyond excited to be filling in this role to pass on the tradition to others around the state. As, many people know we have a declining number of hunters in the state because people are losing the tradition of it. 


Like my family says, if you are truly passionate about hunting, you will find a time to do it. So, as we all have our busy lives working and taking care of families, we are able to do what makes us happy. Many people now, will only hunt if they have time and that is not the true tradition of hunting. Some people will hunt for food, but many people hunt because we enjoy the sport and the camaraderie of our hunting buddies.  

I recently attended a regional meeting for the Instructors and I found that I was the only female in the room and also the only person in the room under the age of 35. This not only surprised me, but made me more empowered to step into this role. Students can take this hunter safety course at the age of 11, or older, and my hope is when that 11 year old girl is sitting in the class, she can look up to me and see that we can make a difference in this male dominated sport!

How Can I bring this into my classroom? My main goal to bring this into the classroom is to teach students about the importance of conservation. One of the main purposes of hunting, is to keep animal populations under control and reduce human-animal conflict. We have probably all seen or heard about a deer vs. car accident and they usually don't end well for the deer or our vehicles. The state implements hunting seasons and bag limits, based on the conflicts that they see, and how we can best keep the food chain in check. The state is divided into Wildlife Management Units, that can sometimes have different limits and sizes of animals based on that individual area. Students can learn in their typical biology course about food webs, but I can go into more depth about specific animal species and how they are affected. 

I want to educate more students about the importance of PA hunting and why it has been a true passion of mine, since the young age of 9. By becoming an instructor, I can not only teach students across the state, but I can learn different things to bring into my classroom to teach my students. I would love to have a taxidermy unit, or possibly a Conservation Officer come into my classroom and speak about the importance of wildlife conservation. 

So, that is how I am expanding my knowledge of agriculture to bring to my classroom of students. I hope that I can bring a little bit of this content into my student teaching classroom and one day maybe an entire course in wildlife.

Thank you for reading along, as this has been quite a fun blog to write!

~Paige 

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