Students learn lessons about climate change and pollution from salmon farming.

The Kenny Lake School in Copper Center, Alaska, is small with about 60 students from kindergarten through high school. It is even less during the winter when some parents homeschool their children due to long commutes and slippery roads.

Jennifer Hodges is a third, fourth and fifth grade teacher. She says her third grader only sits at his desk for 20 minutes a day. They learn a lot by doing things, such as growing coho salmon from eggs to alevin for fry and then releasing them into the lake.

This is done through a program called “Salmon in the Class” created by the Alaska Department of Fish and Wildlife. Keith Morse, Program Director of the Copper River Watershed Project, is responsible for implementing the program in six schools across Alaska’s Copper River watershed.

Coho salmon spawn in autumn, when numerous shoals begin. The eggs remain in the classroom for about six months before they are released into the lakes. After that, they live for two to four years before spawning and then die soon after.

Every day, about a third of Hodges’ students ride the bus 45 minutes from their home village of Chitina. Many students already have experience fishing for salmon, a staple food for Alaska Natives.

“It’s a really delicate balance because we’re dealing with indigenous traditions and culture,” says Hodges. “This is their land, this is their salmon. And so we really need to be a part of it.”

Ahtna, the local tribal association, helped donate a tank in her class.

While many of her students raise salmon for food, few raise them as pets.

“Salmon have evolved from being just a backyard fish they catch for food to a fish they bond with,” says Hodges. “They have a completely different point of view with this project because they know what it takes to actually get past the salmon stages.”

Students will learn about habitat temperature and the effects of climate change.

Learning about climate change is now more important than ever. 2022 was the sixth warmest year on record in the Arctic. But those lessons become concrete for them when raising salmon, which needs cold water to survive.

“We had a glitch in our equipment and the temperature went up about five degrees,” says Hodges.

“Just heating it up, we just destroyed our eggs.”

Another lesson: watching how deadly pollutants can be to salmon’s habitat.


Students practice their writing while watching salmon.

Jennifer Hodges


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Jennifer Hodges


Students practice their writing while watching salmon.

Jennifer Hodges

During the months when salmon is in the classroom, students love to sit by the aquarium and watch it.

“When the eggs hatch, they have bags of food,” says student Addy. “That way they can hide and don’t have to look for food. It’s funny because when they try to swim, they just go around in circles.”

It is, of course, the yolk, the tiny bag of food that the baby salmon comes with. Morse, who oversees the program, says the salmon don’t need to eat until they reach the fry stage.

“For example, by applying hand sanitizer to your hands and then dipping your fingers into the tank, you are contaminating the tank,” says Hodges. “This has happened to us before. We had seven that year. We usually get around 180.”

There is much to learn: mathematics, writing and appreciate nature.

Students like to calculate when the salmon will turn from caviar to fry alevin based on the temperature in the aquarium. For them, this is not the solution of mathematical problems: this is the prediction of the future.

“We always wonder when they will first hatch from their eggs,” says Liam, a student. “It takes math because you have to keep track of their temperature and add their ATU. I’m good at math, so I usually get it right.”

Since Hodges and her students live in such a rural area, there are not many excursions. But every year in May, she takes her students on a salmon tour, where they release the salmon they raised in the classroom.

They will name the fish and then release them into the wild and never see them again. But this is not sad: this is the event of the year.

“The best thing is to release them after you see how they hatch from eggs, turn into fry and take care of them,” says student Fisher. “You can say goodbye.”

The student put the salmon in a bucket and fastened it with a seat belt. Students wear chest boots, rubber overalls to stay dry when they go to the lakes, and then each gets a bowl of about ten fish. Put the cup under the water and let the fish swim out.

“I went to release them last year, but the lake was still partially covered in ice,” says Stirling, a student. “I fell. It was cold, but it was still funny.”

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