By Rebecca Holcomb
Round Table news editor

Trout season is coming early to Sharon Steger’s biology classes.  Steger’s students are participating in a program called Trout in the Classroom, in which students get to raise trout from egg to fingerling.

Many Middletown High School students, including sophomores Emily Jefferson and Taylor Bullen, agree that taking care of the trout and seeing them grow will be a really “cool” experience.

“Our class is really excited to have the trout in our classroom because it’s going to be really fun to watch them grow,” said Jefferson.

The students are responsible for feeding the fish and maintaining the tank. Once the fish have grown to two to three inches in length, they will be released into a stream designated by the Department of Natural Resources, which in this case is the stream at Doubs Park in Myersville.

Steger hopes that the program will teach her students about “conservation and stewardship.”

Steger first heard about TIC when she attended a workshop at a Maryland Association of Environmental Outdoor Education conference. She decided that it would be a great experience for her biology students at MHS to participate in this type of program so she wrote a grant through the Maryland Association of Science Teachers in order to fund it.

Steger is planning on taking her students on field trip to release the trout and take a tour of the Albert Powell Fish Hatchery in Washington County in late May.

– Gallery by Shannon McKenna

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