NAI Blog

I had an opportunity to do some interpretive training recently, in a rather unique setting—on a cruise ship.  The Central Coast Natural History Association was hosting an ocean cruise as a fund-raising activity to help support California State Parks. On the days we were at sea, we included some interpretive training presentations for the docents on the cruise.

The docents and other parks supporters were just a small part of the nearly two thousand people on this cruise ship. During one of our training sessions, looking at various audience segments, it was pointed out that many of the folks on the ship were spending more time in the buffet line or the casino than outdoors on the deck. While a few of us were spending time on deck looking at seabirds and marine mammals, hundreds of other passengers were in the spa, watching movies in the theater, or playing cards in the casino. It became a kind of challenge we issued to ourselves: Let’s see how many of those folks we can get interested in looking at the ocean that is passing by.

We had some limited success standing on the deck with binoculars looking at passing seabirds. The few passengers that walked outside on the decks might stop and ask what we were looking at. And a few others stopped by to listen in on our conversations about glaciers, shearwaters, sun dogs, and sea turtles. But we still weren’t reaching much of that “casino crowd.” We were about to concede defeat in our efforts to connect more passengers to the ocean world around them.

Then something happened that turned the tide in our favor.  A few humpback whales appeared during lunch one day, plainly visible from the crowded buffet seating area—if one was paying attention to the ocean, and we were. I could see the docents jump up, pointing and cheering “whales!” Soon hundreds of diners were on their feet, eagerly looking out at the ocean to spot the whales. They were asking “What kind are they?” “How big are they?” and many other questions.

Over the next few days we saw more whales and dolphins—and more passengers looking out at them. It restored my faith in human kind and in the power of enthusiastic interpretation to inspire even a seemingly “unreachable” audience.  Of course the help of charismatic megafauna like whales certainly helps. I’m not sure we’d have seen the same reaction if we had jumped up and exclaimed: “There’s a Xantus’s murrelet!”

I was reminded how essential it is as an interpreter to get excited about your subject and share that passion with others. That childlike curiosity resides deep within each of us, but it can be easily buried and suppressed as we grow up. An enthusiastic interpreter can peel away that overburden and allow that curiosity, that sense of wonder that Rachel Carson spoke of, to help us rediscover our connections to the world around us. Our own personal passion for nature, history, and heritage is nearly irresistible when applied skillfully—especially when you throw in a whale or two.

BOOM! I like words like that. I read too many comic books as a child. Boom could refer to a noise, an impact (fall down, go boom), or explosive growth among other things. The BOOM to which I refer is the POPULATION BOOM or the Population Bomb as Paul Ehrlich dubbed it in his book in 1968. In 1969 I was just finishing a Master’s Degree in botany at Southern Illinois University (SIU) and this book was popular in the budding environmental movement. In January of 1970 I was teaching environmental workshops for high school students at SIU’s residential camp, Touch of Nature. We talked about this topic every day in these workshops. We also talked about Reverend Thomas Malthus who introduced many of these same concerns in his teaching and writing in the early 1800s.

The population boom on the planet was well portrayed in a brief film produced by environmental design guru, Bucky Fuller, another SIU professor at the time. It showed how the Earth’s human population had increased over the past 5,000 years. A map of the planet would add a light for each million people each second of the film in the location where the growth occurred. The last few seconds of the film would show entire continents turning white and make the point that growth might be a problem. You can see an updated version of this prepared by The Population Connection below.

Dr. Ehrich predicted massive famines by the mid 1980s due to overpopulation. These famines did not come to pass on the scale predicted for lots of reasons. In 1967 Paddock and Paddock wrote Famine 1975: America’s Decision – Who will survive? as another tome along a similar theme. Garrett Hardin’s 1968 article, “Tragedy of the Commons,” in Science magazine also stirred the environmental stew of the time. He pointed out that our self-interest in use of shared resources inevitably leads to overuse and abuse of resources. “Tragedy of the commons,” has become a catchy phrase for these dilemmas that face us with our shared oceans, freshwater and air.

Barry Commoner was an outspoken biologist in the late 60′s and early 70′s who protested nuclear testing and shared his Four Laws of Ecology with us. Ian McHarg, a Scottish ecologist, in a wonderful 1969 film , “Multiply and Subdue the Earth,” urged that we live in harmony with Earth’s ecology and not try to change it. All of these authors and scientists had tremendous influence on the burgeoning environmental movement.

Bucky Fuller pointed out that industrialization chills the birth rate and will eventually reverse it. He predicted that industrialization by 2010 would result in a reversal of world population growth. That hasn’t happened and even the more industrialized nations like the U.S. have growth in population. And the individual demand for resources among people in developed nations is growing as well. We use more energy per capita and want more stuff.

I can assure you that much of what we taught and shared with young people in our environmental workshops was absolutely truthful, but we often used doomsday messages and alarmist language that scared people. Most people wanted the alarmists to be wrong. We were wrong in terms of the decade in which the crises of varied dimensions would appear.

Lots of the research done since then would suggest that we would be better in helping people understand how the world works, so they arrive at their own conclusions about where we are headed – environmental literacy. Certainly most interpreters and environmental educators attempt to do that. I simply wonder if we don’t need to spend more time talking about world population and the implications of growth. If the Earth is our PIE, now shared among 6.78 billion people, how will the sharing go in 50 years when it’s shared amongst 14 billion people. Only 17% of the planet is suitable for human habitation. Only 4% will grow crops. These are real limits on growth. Will we trade diverse animals and cultures for not being willing to curb our own population? Have we already traded away many valuable resources? Isn’t population growth the root cause of many other social conflicts, resource battles and social injustices?

Much of our understanding of global environmental problems has changed and matured over the past 40 years but the population BOOM continues. I think we interpret best on this subject when we help people understand how the planet sustains itself through natural systems. There are many stories we can be telling about the impacts of population growth. I think it’s timely to devote more effort to this while recognizing that exaggeration or doomsday talk simply turns off our audience and destroys our credibility.

In the comic books I read as a kid, Superman would fly in and sock the bad guys. Boom! Zap! Blooey! Pogo, a 70s cartoon possum said, “We have met the enemy and he is us.” It rang true. The bad guys are all of us to some degree. The planet’s ecosystems continually readjust and adapt to changes, many of which we create. We need better interpretation of the challenges and opportunities we face. We need to tell the stories of how we have grown and changed in response to growing pains on the planet.

As Malthus suggested nature ultimately solves all population problems in some pretty basic and brutal ways – famine, disease, competition, etc. Humans already face these in many parts of the world. How might we all do more to help people understand what’s at stake as human populations grow? What are your thoughts?

-Tim Merriman

A few weeks ago it was looking like most of California’s 279 state park units might be closing due to the state’s budget crisis. A lot of public pressure was brought to bear against park closures, and the legislature reinstated a portion of the park system budget. However, the governor has “blue lined” another $6 million from the proposed budget. At this point the state may still close 100 or more park units.  As of this writing, the list of closures is still pending.

When you think about it, you can’t realistically lock the gates on most parks. There are all kinds of entry points where folks can and will sneak in. Without the general public using the parks, there is an increased potential for arson, vandalism and other damage to park resources. So you have to keep some staff presence to protect the resource. What is eliminated from a closed park is the revenue generation from entrance and camping fees, access for legitimate recreators (who are also voters!) school field trips to learn about the cultural and natural history of their state—and yes, you may reduce some maintenance and staff costs in the bargain, but this is no bargain. In fact, it has been estimated that each dollar spent in operating state parks generates over $2 in the local economies that service park visitors. So this stands to be a significant hit to some rural economies around California. And then there’s the issue of potential violation of contractual agreements with concessionaires and cooperating associations in parks that are closed.

Many years ago I did my thesis research on the California State Park System, and conducted a system-wide analysis of all the units at that time (as I recall there were about 180 units at that point).  This was in the early 1980’s when California was grappling with severe budget reductions as a result of a property tax limitation measure adopted by voters (Proposition 13). One chapter of that thesis explored the concept of “cutback management,” with the suggestion of reducing expenses by closing or reducing effort in parks that weren’t as economically viable as others. While this made sense from a data analysis perspective, it was a very unpopular idea politically. Park units are established for many reasons—protecting unique resources, creating recreational opportunities, helping to generate economic activity in some areas. We rarely create parks to make money, yet we seem to be using revenue as the measuring stick to judge the value of parks these days. I learned the folly of that approach as a graduate student years ago, and that approach is just as unrealistic today.

Our heritage is a public good, far beyond an economic necessity. Interpreters are the way we connect to that heritage. Without both, we can easily become adrift in a culture with no sense of direction. To save our heritage is to save ourselves. There’s no price tag large enough to match that value.

I am not trying to lapse into netlingo or shortspeak, if you read my blog on that recently. The IC is the NAI International Conference and the registration form for it has just been posted. It will be in Oz, as Australia is affectionately dubbed by some, from April 13 to 17, 2010. Townsville, Australia, on the Great Barrier Reef between Brisbane and Cairns in Queensland is the destination. Sam Ham recommended the community as a great area where he has done considerable work as a consultant. It is near several national parks and on the edge of the famous reef with wonderful snorkeling and diving opportunities.

This meeting is a being done in collaboration with our friends and colleagues in the Interpretation Australia Association and the Townsville City Council. Like NAI they conduct an annual conference and have an active membership with high quality publications. Getting acquainted with them will be great fun for all who attend.

If you have longed to visit DOWN UNDER, this is a very rich opportunity. The program itself will be fascinating and involve presenters from 20 or more countries. The off-site sessions and pre and post conference trips are great. The registration materials are available now at Interpnet.com. The post meeting ecotour to the outback and New Zealand will be especially interesting, the trip of a lifetime.

The deadline for getting on the program for this fifth International Conference is September 30, so think about submitting a program if you plan to go. Though some of the expense for doing this may be tax-deductible, the best reason to go is likely to be the wonderful professional friendships that develop. Several participants at this meeting in Greece this past April had been to three or all of the four past events. The relationships have come to matter to many who attend. Our recent trip to Malawi to visit the Museums of Malawi programs tracks back to meeting Michael Gondwe and Aaron Maluwa during their presentation at the Vancouver IC in 2007. They attended on scholarships and inspired all of us to learn more of their unique work.

There are always good economic reasons to put off such trips, but life is short. If you can wrangle a way to make this conference in Townsville, I think you will be glad you did. See you there.

- Tim Merriman

As I sit here writing, I’m enjoying a dried apricot.  Not just any apricot, but one that was grown in David Packard’s orchard that surrounds the Packard home in Los Altos Hills on the San Francisco Peninsula.  Most folks know David Packard as the co-founder of Hewlett Packard, makers of computers and other electronic devices.  What you may not know is that Mr. Packard was a devoted outdoorsman who loved to hunt and fish, raised prize cattle, spent long hours in his own blacksmith shop, and yes—loved his apricot orchard.  Each year at this time Mr. Packard would bring a bushel basket of dried apricots to the Monterey Bay Aquarium to share with the volunteers and staff.  These were beautiful Blenheim apricots that were grown, harvested and dried by the Packard family.  Somehow sharing these apricots with us was a way of sharing a little bit of themselves with the rest of us.

David Packard grew up in Pueblo, Colorado, in an era when hiking, hunting, fishing, and horseback riding were a common part of a boy’s life.  As a boy, David Packard lived close to the land.  David Packard the man kept that enduring connection to the land throughout his life.  As the Hewlett Packard company became increasingly successful, Mr. Packard had the means to support open space and habitat preservation efforts.  The Packard Foundation has played a significant role in preserving critical habitats, particularly in California where rapid urbanization is overtaking so much open space.

As more and more of us grow up in urban settings, fostering that abiding connection to the land becomes increasingly difficult.  I worry about where the next John Muir, Aldo Leopold or David Packard will come from.  I do know that next generation of stewards is more than likely in a park, a nature center, a zoo or aquarium right now, where interpreters are helping to nurture the values that are common to conservation leaders in any era.  You see that connection to the land is so often inspired through a close connection to other people that love the land.  Those people may be parents or relatives, a camp counselor, teacher, a naturalist or interpreter or others.  It’s a responsibility we all share if we care about the future and nurturing the next generation of stewards.

Of the many contributions he made in so many areas, David Packard felt that resource conservation—taking care of the land—would far outlast his other activities.  Seeing how he inspired that conservation ethic in his children and grandchildren, and how they carry on his love of nature, I think he may be right.  That apricot orchard not only produced a delicious crop of fruit every year, but the love that David and Lucile Packard invested in those trees taught their family to love the land, and that lesson will bear fruit for many generations to come.

In 1993 I left the relative comfort of being E.D. of a 501(c)3 at the GNCP in Pueblo, CO, for the strange new world of TVA at LBL in Golden Pond, KY. I soon learned we would be working on a NRMP in compliance with the NEPA process which could involve many EISs and it all had to be done ASAP. A short two years later we were all RIFed and I took the EARLY OUT bonus and returned to 501(c)3 land with NAI. OMG, LOL!

Jargon is a given condition with any organization. Even the small nonprofit Greenway and Nature Center of Pueblo (GNCP) I served in Colorado, bandied about terms like 501(c)3 and UBIT as if everyone should understand us. The legal designation of a nonprofit charitable organization with the United States Internal Revenue Service is a 501(c)3 and UBIT refers to unrelated business income tax, a tax nonprofits must pay if making money from enterprises unrelated to their nonprofit purpose. It’s all explainable. It’s just easier to talk to others like us with acronyms, NETLINGO or other forms of SHORTSPEAK.

Adding to the confusion is the NETLINGO, the language of the Internet and texting. Many of us are lucky enough to have a teenager at home with a cell phone who can translate almost anything sent as a text message or through an instant message format online.

OMG  (Oh my God), BRB (Be right back), and LOL (Laugh out loud) are just a few of the many commonly used terms in social networking and text messaging. For a quick lesson on this language go to NetLingo.com for a quick lesson in this obscure new lingo our kids seem to absorb by digital osmosis. Check out their TOP 50 to avoid KPC (keeping parents clueless) and you will learn that some of the NETLINGO is numeric code. F2F, Face to Face, makes sense but how did 459 become “I love you” and 420 is “marijuana.” Many of the top 50 are sex related and serve well in shutting out the parent reading over the shoulders of a teenager. PAW is Parents are watching. They know we’re lingering there trying to decipher this new language.

What has all this to do with interpretation of natural and cultural heritage? I’m not sure. I think we use a bit too much jargon or lingo at work, especially with new employees who are coping with culture shock in the new setting. When talking to our various public audiences, we especially need to avoid lingo that leaves them behind. We need to define our terms and help them understand why some forms of shortened language have fallen into common usage such as NEPA (National Environmental Policy Act), ESA (Endangered Species Act) or EIS (Environmental Impact Statement). When we are in the room with partners, funders, and regulators, it’s vital to be very clear about what we are speaking and avoid insider lingo. Clarity of communication is essential with new relationships.

Many of us work with young people and knowing NETLINGO can be a great help to us. It’s an opportunity to make our messages connect by using terms they enjoy and understand. And it allows us to listen and learn when they are use terms intended to leave us behind such as PIR (parent in room).

Interpreters are communication specialists of a unique kind. We help people connect with resources through unique experiences that often involve language, written or spoken. The new forms of NETLINGO, SHORTSPEAK, or older bureaucratic language of acronyms will continue to evolve and be used by many. We can choose to use it or not use it to make our messages and conversations more interesting and more likely to inspire and provoke thought.

I know I left out some important subsets of jargon and symbols that we use commonly. I’ll think about it and write more on it later. Right now, I must go 10-7.

- Tim Merriman

This past Monday one of our volunteers at the Monterey Bay Aquarium celebrated her birthday.  That’s not unusual—our volunteers are like a second family for each other and they celebrate births, anniversaries, birthdays and many other life events.  What was a noteworthy about this celebration was that this volunteer was 92 years old.  Moreover, she played 18 holes of golf in the morning before spending 4 hours talking to guests at the Aquarium!

I started thinking about the volunteers I work with that are remarkably young for their age.  A number of our volunteers were newly retired when the Aquarium opened 25 years ago, which puts them in their 80s and 90s today—and still going strong.  Studies of seniors who are aging successfully show that they have a good support network of friends, have a strong sense of purpose, actively contribute to their community and stay mentally and socially active.  That sounds like the job description for a volunteer!

As staff resources get increasingly stretched for many of us, volunteers are playing a growing role in filling the gaps of many program support and delivery needs.  Many of us are in the volunteer business in a big way, and increasing our effectiveness at recruiting, training and managing volunteers is a top priority.  There’s also a growing trend among volunteers to make shorter time commitments and jump from one volunteer opportunity to the next in order to sample a variety of experiences.  That’s certainly their prerogative, but that pattern doesn’t really yield the same benefits as a long term volunteer commitment.

As you work on your next volunteer recruitment or recognition opportunity, you may want to honor those long-term volunteers and highlight the benefits of sticking with a volunteer assignment for a few years.  The payoff is far greater.  It might just add a few years to someone’s life!

I would like to take this opportunity to recognize the hundreds of volunteers that are responsible for the success of NAI.  Your board members, region and section officers, committee members at all levels, workshop planners, and a host of others—are all volunteers.  NAI couldn’t begin to function without the efforts of hundreds of volunteers each year.  Thanks for your labors on behalf of our professional community!

I’ve recently been intrigued with how we explain the importance of what we do in heritage interpretation to folks who do not understand it. It just seems like we talk to people and do fun stuff. I can’t be serious or terribly important – can it? I like the metaphor of parenting our heritage because its a universal reference for most folks.

Parenting is highly regarded as one of the most important things we will do in our lives. We raise children and launch them into the world, hoping that the world is a better place for knowing them and they are better people due to our good parenting. When they are very young, we clean up after them, we give them time-outs or other punishment to attempt to extinguish undesirable behavior. We reason with them about how they should behave and why it matters. We teach values. Most likely all of these approaches are necessary but which one endures. We can’t clean up after them or punish them forever. At some point we must hope our  values training worked.

Natural and cultural heritage sites are not much different from our homes. We maintain them by cleaning up after the public. We use law enforcement to deal with seriously problematic behavior. We employ interpretation to help the visitor or guest understand the importance of the resource. We want them to value it and take care of it – become better stewards.

It’s good to have all of these useful tools in resource management. Interpretation is not always valued enough by management but we have to value it ourselves as a management tool. We have to think of what we do as part of the management effort at interpretive sites.

Just as kids influence each other on a school yard to do right things or wrong things, visitors live by the norms of a heritage site. If most folks litter and the site is a mess, most of us accept that as the norm. If most folks keep a site clean, the pressure is on those who might drop a soda can or fast food box. We are aware of others watching just as children are in their environments. Great interpretation helps shift the norms toward more desirable behavior.

As with parenting of children, we must use the right tool at the right time. Interpretation is the one tool that gives hope for a better future for natural and cultural heritage protection. When we change the norms in good ways, it’s likely a lasting change. When you clean up after someone or arrest them, you likely have it to do again in the future.

-Tim Merriman

When Peter Benchley wrote Jaws in 1973, he may have been inspired by a series of shark attacks along the Jersey Shore in 1916 as well as the exploits of Frank Mundus, a trophy shark fisher that caught a 4,550 white shark off Long Island.  His original work was a little more historic in nature, but he was asked to make it a little more sensational in nature in order to publish it.  A few years later, when the book was made into a movie, the story was sensationalized a little more, so the Jaws that we all saw on the big screen featured toothy leviathan that was evil incarnate.

Benchley was fascinated with sharks for the rest of his life, and as he studied them he became increasingly aware of the true nature of sharks as critical predators in marine ecosystems. Benchley visited us at the Monterey Bay Aquarium and was an outspoken advocate for shark conservation. He said that he felt responsible in some ways for creating such a negative image for sharks and he devoted the rest of his life to supporting efforts to save sharks.

This past week we brought a young great white shark to the Aquarium where our visitors can meet her up close and personal. This isn’t the first, in fact this is the fifth time we’ve had a white shark guest with us—but it’s just as exciting as the first time. Because of the rapid growth rate of these animals, they usually outgrow our exhibit after a few months and are released. The previous four sharks were tagged upon release, and the tags indicate they made their way back toward Southern California and Baja California.  So we try to learn as much from them as we can during their brief stay with us.

I’ve now had a chance to watch thousands of people get their first glimpse of a great white shark. They often approach with a combination of fear and curiosity written on their faces.  Upon seeing the shark, that fear quickly changes to fascination. The curiosity takes over and the questions begin flying as people now want to understand this remarkable animal. I think Peter Benchley would be very happy with our work with sharks.

Authentic, first-hand encounters with animals have a power to inspire that eclipses any other interpretive technique I’ve seen.  These encounters can alter the sensationalized images of wildlife—be they sharks, snakes, spiders or others—and help us to grasp the true nature of these creatures.

If you’d like to see our white shark, you can check it out on the Monterey Bay Aquarium Outer Bay webcam at: http://www.montereybayaquarium.org/efc/efc_outerbay/outerbay_cam.aspx. Or better yet, come on by and meet a great white shark in person!