I grew up in a home with three brothers and a sister, where all of us were raised by two highly educated parents. My mom was a school teacher and my father was a very creative and hard-working man. Both parents were passionate in regards to childhood development. My father built us boys a work bench and placed it right next to his. When it came time for any projects, we would work right alongside my dad, using our own tools and mimicking what he was building. My mom was (and still is) an avid gardener and spent her spare time with many gardening and artistic projects. We all had our respective assignments after school and on the weekends. At home, we were taught using a hands-on approach to learning, which paralleled our traditional classroom education.
Recently, I was thrilled to be contacted by the corporate board of education from the Rockwood School District, with a request to give a seminar on termites to a very bright third grade class of gifted students at the Center for Creative Learning. The children were doing a project with lasers and wanted to find a way to make them more beneficial to our daily lives. They thought of a way to locate, identify and eventually, eradicate termites using lasers. As a local, pest control professional, I was called in to aide with an education on termite biology. I jumped at the chance to work with the Rockwood School District as a partner in education and give a presentation to the class.
I was just as enthused as the children, who were well-informed, interactive and more than willing to participate. Recalling my own early development, I wanted the children to share the same passion for education as I did when I was growing up. Half of the class was spent in a traditional classroom setting. I was giving the lecture and they were taking notes, listening and asking questions. The second half of the class was spent with visual aides, studying termite specimens I had brought with me and finally, hands-on experience with an actual laser! Well, my first concept of a laser anyway, which was a large magnifying glass. We went outside where the children learned to harness the energy of sunlight by passing it through a medium, resulting in a concentrated and powerful beam of light. If you get my hidden meaning, the boys and girls learned how to eradicate termites by harnessing the suns energy as it passed through a magnifying glass. They became consumed with the benefits of lasers and suddenly came up with new and inventive ways to eradicate all kinds of common household items … leaves, backpacks, school books – you get the idea.
Of course, no visit to a local school would be complete without tasty treats! I had to positively reinforce all the wonderful things they learned with gift certificates to enjoy ice cream at one of my client’s frozen yogurt stores!
Education is one of the pillars of our company philosophy and we are always looking for ways to give back to our community. We very much enjoyed meeting and working with the children of the Rockwood School District and look forward to continuing our partnership in enriching young people’s lives. All of us here at the professional pest management company Bugs By Brian are hopeful that our involvement will make your neighborhood a better place for you and your family.
– Brian D. Nauert, President
Enjoy these photos from Bugs by Brian’s visit to Rockwood School District.
