Hampton City Schools Oyster Gardeners Exhibit at the Shellabration Event

Hampton City Schools teachers and students involved in oyster restoration efforts staffed an educational exhibit at the Shellabration event held in downtown Hampton on Saturday, November 19, 2022, from noon to 4 p.m.

Kilgore Gifted Center teachers Michele Ferrel, Jovita Fergus, and Paula Larson and students Trinity Fullwood, Mia Kelley, Courtney Leonard, Finley Marmet, Maci Minkoff, Brenya and William Nowicki, Vada Pitts, Rhusha Scales, Jonah Seeger, and Lily Wiliams showed off the oysters they have been raising and the oyster research they have been working on. Hampton High School teacher Ashley Ault, Jones Magnet Middle School teacher Sheryl McLaughlin, and Jones students Ariyana Washington and Hannah Huff were also on hand to talk to participants about oyster restoration efforts taking place in Hampton City Schools.  

The students greeted the visitors to their exhibit and engaged them in oyster trivia. Guests spun the “Oyster Wheel of Knowledge” to determine a question category and students then posed a question and provided prizes for correctly answered questions about oyster history, restoration efforts in HCS, or the Chesapeake Bay. The students and teachers also had the opportunity to learn more themselves by visiting other educational vendors at the event, such as the Chesapeake Bay Foundation, Chesapeake Oyster Alliance, Hampton History Museum, the Virginia Institute of Marine Science, Lambert Shellfish, Virginia Tech’s Seafood Agricultural Research and Extension Center (AREC), Hampton Roads Sanitation District, Hampton University, and Resilient Hampton.

The Shellabration was the brainchild of Shored Up LLC, a local ecotourism company and HCS Oyster Restoration partner, that was developed in collaboration with the Downtown Hampton Development Partnership and the Chesapeake Oyster Alliance.  

Currently, students participating as part of the exhibit checked all four focus areas in the HCS Portrait of a Graduate:

• achieved and appropriately applied academic content knowledge
• integrated and applied classroom knowledge to the real world
• communicated, collaborated, and demonstrated leadership through building connections with diverse members of the community
• develops and demonstrates a positive sense of self and purpose

The HCS oyster restoration display boards were designed by Matt Houser and the HCS graphics department and produced by Marty Wood and the HCS print shop.