The indigenous Kiwchua students attending Pachacutik Primary School in eastern Ecuador offered Carolina Arroyo an assortment of blank stares as she began her Powerpoint presentation on the importance of the Narupa Nature Reserve. Amidst the austere classroom’s silence, Arroyo, who is a reserve director for Fundación Jocotoco, began to wonder if the students, living in a remote village only five kilometers from the reserve, were even aware of its presence. The silence that followed her questions about the reserve’s importance confirmed her suspicions and the students soon admitted that what they were hearing was news.Quickly adapting to the circumstances, Arroyo continued her presentation and found that the students, clustered together on one side of the tin-roofed classroom, listened with growing interest as she displayed colorful photos of the migratory birds of found in the area. Although they recognized many, Arroyo was interested in emphasizing one in particular – the Cerulean warbler – whose fate is intricately intertwined with the success of the nearby reserve.

Along with several of her Jocotoco colleagues, Arroyo travelled to this remote corner of Ecuador two weeks ago as part of a Rainforest Trust funded project to protect critical Cerulean warbler wintering grounds in the subtropical foothills of the Andes. During the course of two days she addressed more than one hundred students in several local schools as part of the environmental education component of this project.

“Initially, the kids had no knowledge about the Narupa Reserve, but they showed a lot of interest in it, the birds that live there, and, above all, in visiting,” Arroyo said.

The education element of the “Conservation of Cerulean Warbler in Eastern Ecuador” project was designed to teach local community members and school children about the importance of the reserve as a source of biodiversity, environmental services, and a refuge for endangered migratory bird species.

After finding the children warming up to the subject during her first visit, Arroyo discovered more interest on a second trip made last week. During this recent visit she reiterated the importance of forests, described the benefits they present to humans, as well as the threats they face. At the end of lesson, the children were asked to draw bird species that they knew about or had seen near their homes. The results, Arroyo found, were encouraging as the children depicted an impressive variety of bird species.

She has another trip planned later this month to take students on a field trip to the reserve, which will be a first for most of the children.

“There is no doubt that education is a key component to any successful conservation project,” said Rainforest Trust CEO, Dr. Paul Salaman. “Our commitment to environmental education has always been strong, and in this case we were eager to help Jocotoco work with local school children. These kids will soon be making decisions that affect their environment, and it’s essential they have the knowledge to make the right choice.”

Although extremely important as a wintering grounds for the Cerulean Warbler and other migratory bird species, the subtropical and humid forests of eastern Ecuador are severely threatened by deforestation. The “Conservation of Cerulean Warbler in Eastern Ecuador” project was developed to improve the protection and management of the Narupa Reserve, one of the most important wintering sites for the Cerulean Warbler. Apart from environmental education, the project will result in the purchase of new lands to expand the Narupa Nature Reserve, the hiring of new parks guards, increased monitoring of cerulean warbler population in the reserve, and necessary infrastructure improvements for the reserve.

To see more photos of this project visit our Flickr site.