Julie Martin’s third-grade classroom at Eisenhower Elementary School recently became home to an aquarium of local fish. Part of the Lake in the Classroom program operated by Grace College’s Kosciusko Lakes and Streams center, this marks the 20th aquarium placed in a Kosciusko County school or community center this school year. That’s more than they’ve had any other year.

“This is a milestone. It showcases tremendous community support and confirms the success of the program,” said Anna Burke, Lakes and Streams program manager. “Best of all, it means we’re reaching more students than ever with a message of the importance of being educated about our water resources in order to better care for them.”

The 20 aquariums are distributed throughout the county and can be found in the Wawasee, Whitko and Warsaw school corporations. This includes multiple aquariums at Syracuse Elementary School and one at North Webster Elementary School, as well as an aquarium at the Syracuse Community Center.

“We love our fish tank,” said Kim Jones, a fourth-grade teacher at Syracuse Elementary School. “When I first got involved with the program, immediately after the aquarium was installed I had a group of female students approach me to let me know that this was their first time seeing real, live fish that weren’t either on their plate or on television.”

A participating classroom receives not only an aquarium with local fish and plants but is also supplied with a library of freshwater ecology books. This is so students can learn about the science of local lakes and streams and about what they are observing in the aquarium.

KLAS staff provide ongoing support to the teacher and class throughout the year and disassemble the aquarium prior to the summer.

KLAS operates Lake in the Classroom with the support of sponsors. This year’s sponsors are Wawasee Area Conservancy Foundation, Syracuse Lake Association, Wawasee Property Owners Association, city of Warsaw Stormwater Utility, Silveus Insurance Group, Dekko Foundation, CenturyLink, Louis Dreyfus Commodities, Paragon Medical and Winona Lake Preservation Association.

Kosciusko Lakes and Streams is a center at Grace College that focuses on applied research, education and community collaboration. For more information on Kosciusko Lakes and Streams visit water.grace.edu.

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Images can be found at:  http://kosciuskolakes.imgur.com/

Group shots:  Kosciusko Lakes and Streams staff and Grace College students, Miles Barber (l) and John DeVries (r), deliver an introductory aquarium presentation to Julie Martin’s third-grade class at Eisenhower Elementary School.

Close up of student/tank: Eisenhower Elementary School third-grader, Xander, gets an up-close look at his classroom aquarium that is part of the Lake in the Classroom program operated by Kosciusko Lakes and Streams.