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Candace
Orcutt '57 Courtney
Grimes '78 Lynn
Brunelle '85
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The spectacular New Zealand glow worm lights up its body to attract mosquitoes for dinner, but Martha Child Ash '67 has landed in the news for using that light just as craftily to attract and educate thousands of children. Schoolchildren are eager to learn about the amazing cave-dwelling, mosquito-eating worm (actually a maggot) with the phosphorescent rear end. Ash takes the opportunity to give them a lesson about the caves, the worms' entire ecosystem and general environmental issues while she has their attention. Funded by the country's Ministry of Education and recently reported in the Waitomo News, more than 6,000 children visited Ash's program last year in Waitomo, a rural New Zealand town of just 300 residents. "Children are able to learn about the world under their feet and have some adventure sport at the same time," reported the newspaper, noting that children often go caving and rafting as part of this very popular lesson plan. In total, about 500,000 tourists visit each year to see the famous glow worms in Waitomo (Chelsea Clinton was among recent guests) as they cling by the thousands to the roof of the cave in an uncanny simulation of the night sky. Unwitting insects emerge from the underground river that flows through the cave and fly into the cave's perpetual night, only to become ensnared in the sticky silk threads that the worms dangle from the ceiling. Ash says she never dreamed while sitting in sociology class on Mayflower Hill that she would find herself educating children in caves in rural New Zealand–and she certainly never imagined singing there. The former Colbyette helped start a chorus that gives an annual holiday concert under the "sky" in the cave, which has played host to other musicians and is renowned for its acoustics. You can learn about the education services run by Ash at the Waitomo Museum of Caves at www.waitomo-museum.co.nz.
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