James Madison University
IN-50: Innovation D

The Gus Bus, a program through JMU's Institute for Innovation in Health and Human Services (IIHHS), focuses on bringing academic enrichment to local children through mobile classroom vehicles. With these vehicles, the Gus Bus creates a low stakes environment, using books and interactive, ungraded activities to bring literacy, creativity and math skills to local elementary schools. “Supporting a child starts with literacy, but it doesn’t end there,” said Janelle Erb, Gus Bus Curriculum and Program Manager. 

To expand its goal of inspiring joy in learning, the Gus Bus has been partnering with the National Park Service (NPS) since fall 2022.   This partnership was made possible through the NPS’s grant from the National Environment and Education Foundation. Through this partnership, the NPS has been bringing park rangers to Spotswood and Stone Spring elementary schools to guest teach every other week.

The theme NPS and the Gus Bus decided on is pollinators. The park rangers have been educating the kids on what pollinators are, what they do, how they help to produce food and the overall importance of attracting pollinators to the community.   One park ranger who is involved with guest teaching at the elementary schools is Margo Roseum. 

Along with teaching on this theme, Roseum has been helping the students create a blueprint for a pollinator garden. Spotswood Elementary School has begun to build their garden, but Stone Spring had to adjust their plans as they don’t have the space for a garden at the moment.  Instead of a garden, the students at Stone Spring Elementary School will be taking what they have learned about pollinators, healthy soil and decomposition, and planting potted plants around the school.  

Roseum said both projects have allowed the students to understand the ecosystem that’s close to them. With the Shenandoah National Park being close to both elementary schools, she said the lessons the kids are taught and the projects that they’re doing are giving them a physical connection to the landscape around them.   “I’m hoping [the kids] get a sense of pride for their school,” Roseum said. “I want them to feel connected to the national park and to the nature that’s in their own backyard. We have a lot of the same plant and pollinator species in the forest and the valley. I really want them to understand the physical connection to the park, but also, the feeling of pride that comes with conservation efforts within their own community.” 

“Through these projects, our hope is that, in the future, some of these students will want to attract pollinators to their backyards,” Erb said. “I’ve seen them take the knowledge they’re learning and share it with others and to take it home to their families and communities.”" https://www.jmu.edu/news/chbs/2023/04-25-nps-gusbus.shtml, Accessed 9/7/23.

Credit completed by Essa Paterson, ISNW, 9/7/23