While virtually every activity of the Robert Cooper Audubon Society has an underlying educational goal, some of our most important educational programs are aimed at children, youth, and university students. If you have an idea for an educational activity for our chapter, contact Abby Shaw, Education Chair, at abigail.shaw@bsu.edu.
Youth birding trip
May 16 | 9-11 a.m. | Red-tail Nature Preserve
The Robert Cooper Audubon Society is teaming up with Red-tail Land Conservancy to offer a youth birding trip at the Red-tail Nature Preserve on Saturday, May 16. This event is open to all ages, but materials will target ages 8-15. Children must be accompanied by a parent or guardian.
Participants will:
- Get a close look at an Osprey platform—and probably an Osprey—using a spotting telescope
- Learn to use binoculars (loaner binoculars will be available)
- Learn to identify some of our native Indiana birds and migrating birds
- Learn about the relationship among native plants, insects, and the birds they support
- Learn about plants and birds of the prairie vs. birds of the woods and the lake
The program is free to attend, but registration is required. For more information and to register, go to Learn about Nature through Birding – Red-tail Land Conservancy.
Fox Student Grant – 2025 recipient
The recipient of the 2025 Fox Graduate Student Grant was Sara Isgate!
Sara is working toward a Ph.D. in the Evolution, Ecology, and Behavior graduate program in Indiana University’s Department of Biology. She has developed original behavioral assays to measure cognition in free‑living birds and quantify how birds adapt to obstacles in their environment. She will use the results to better understand how global warming and heatwaves influence cognitive performance in Tree Swallows.
About the Fox Student Grant: Early each year, graduate students who are conducting bird-centered research on species native to Indiana, including migratory species that breed in Indiana, are invited to apply for the Fox Student Grant. The grant, made possible through the generosity of RCAS members Josie and Geoff Fox, awards up to $1,500 for the purchase of supplies and/or support for travel and field research expenses.
Applicants must be graduate degree-seeking students from an accredited university or college. The research proposal must focus on bird species native to Indiana, including migratory species that breed in Indiana. Proposals for the study of habitat critical to the breeding and wintering grounds of said species will also be considered.
Past recipients (and the year they received the grant) are Clay Delancey (M.S., Ball State University, 2016), Garrett MacDonald (M.S., Ball State University, 2017), Mary Woodruff (Ph.D., Indiana University, 2019), Lara Jones (M.S. Ball State University, 2021), Ryan Leys (M.Sc., University of Waterloo, Canada, 2021), Tabitha Olsen (M.Sc., University of Central Oklahoma, 2022), Julian Grudens (M.S., Ball State University, 2023), Brit Nahorney (M.S., Ball State University, 2023), Kaitlyn E. Young (M.Sc., Purdue University, 2024), and Victoria Moreira (M.Sc., West Chester University, 2024).
RCAS Youth Conservation Scholarship
Each year, the winner of our chapter’s Charles Wise Youth Conservation Award receives a Robert Cooper Audubon Society Conservation Scholarship.
The scholarship may be used by the winners to fund an ecology project that they have designed or want to participate in.
Audubon Adventures
Local teachers of 3rd through 5th grades are invited to request Audubon Adventures kits. Each kit serves a classroom of up to 32 children and contains four nature- or conservation-related themes for each academic year.
If you are an educator or you know an educator who would like to use Audubon Adventures in a classroom, or if you’d like to sponsor Audubon Adventures for a classroom, please please contact Education Chair, Abby Shaw (abigail.shaw@bsu.edu).
Past Education Programs
We’ve created and hosted many programs for children in East Central Indiana, introducing them to birds, other wildlife, and their habitats, often in collaboration with other local organizations.
Our Nature Play Days and our involvement with Nature Preschool Summer Camp helped dozens of preschool children learn about common bird species.
Our birding class and hike during Camp Prairie Creek—a free environmental day camp for youth, sponsored by Muncie Sanitary District/Stormwater Management—introduced 80 campers to local birds, habitat, and birdwatching.
We’ve brought in special speakers like Dr. Tom Sproat, a wildlife biologist from Kentucky, who let kids and their parents get a close-up look at live owls and hawks. In 2015, we collaborated with the Whitely Neighborhood Association to launch our About Birds program. We distributed copies of Cathryn Sill’s book About Birds and binoculars to after-school programs in Muncie. In the following years we continued to host periodic About Birds activities for kids at Cooper Farm and other locations.
Robert Cooper Audubon Society 