Penobscot Classrooms is a two-year collaboration between Maine Audubon and Bangor Schools, funded by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s B-WET (Bay Watershed Education and Training) program, culminating in several community environmental learning projects spearheaded by students. Since 2023, Maine Audubon educators from Fields Pond have worked with all 13 of Bangor’s 5th grade classrooms—more than 500 students—bringing place-based environmental learning to life both inside and outside the classroom. In addition, Maine Audubon staff provided professional development, curriculum, equipment, and other community resources to Bangor teachers to assist with the integration of place-based environmental education into their curriculum.
In 2025, the final chapter of the Penobscot Classrooms journey is coming to life in vibrant, hands-on projects blooming across Bangor. Check this page as we’ll add regular updates about these projects:
• Fifth-graders in Ms. Grunder’s class at Mary Snow School in Bangor created a mural celebrating the relationship between native plants and healthy ecosystems, and also planted native species on their school grounds to help restore biodiversity right where they learn and play. Read more about the project here >
• Fifth-graders in Ms. Mullin’s class at Mary Snow School in Bangor have been tackling the issue of habitat loss for cavity-nesting birds in their local watershed by building and installing bluebird boxes. Read more about this project here >
• Mr. Hobbs and Mr. Coburn’s 5th grade classes at Fairmount School in Bangor took a deep dive into the world of bats—and emerged as true wildlife advocates, learning about and then building bat boxes. Read more about this project here >
• Leonard’s Mills Logging Museum: Fifth-graders in Ms. Bendure’s class at Mary Snow School in Bangor took a field trip to Leonard’s Mills Logging Museum in Bradley. There, students met with fish biologist Max Tritt and took part in an immersive, real-world investigation of sea-run fish. Equipped with nets and buckets, the students collected live alewives attempting to enter Chemo Pond from Blackman Stream. Read more about this project >
• At Essex Woods, we are working alongside Bangor Parks and Recreation to create vibrant new pollinator gardens using Maine native plants.
• This spring, fifth-graders in Ms. Estes’ class at Mary Snow School in Bangor wrapped up a yearlong investigation into watershed health with an inspiring environmental action project, thanks to support from the NOAA Bay Watershed Education and Training (B-WET) grant program. Their learning journey brought them from the top of Copeland Hill in Holden to the meadows of Essex Woods in Bangor, connecting classroom concepts to real-world stewardship in their own backyard. More >
• At the Cross Insurance Center in Bangor and the Collins Center for the Arts at the University of Maine in Orono, students installed BirdSafe window decals of their own spring-themed artwork to help protect migrating birds from striking the exterior windows of the buildings. More >
• At the Maine Discovery Museum, students will complete and unveil a community mural (shown in progress in the photo below) they helped paint alongside Christiana Becker—a descendant of the Penobscot Nation and Curator of Education at the Abbe Museum in Bar Harbor—that celebrates their learning and our shared connection to the Penobscot River watershed.
