Greenbelt Elementary Sets School of Fish Free

Fourth-graders from released more than a thousand American shad fish into the Anacostia River on May 6, the culmination of a three-month effort to help boost the river's shad population.

On Wednesday, guests attending the school’s multicultural dinner, from 6 to 7:30 p.m., will get a chance to hear about the students' grand adventure, which began in March when fourth-grade teacher Elizabeth Stewart-Hancock and two of her colleagues began teaching their students about the shad’s plight.

They ate it up, according to Hancock. Shifting into high gear, her students began building and preparing hatcheries for the fish eggs that the Living Classrooms Foundation would provide.

When the eggs arrived months later, their numbers were far greater than the school had expected. Sixth-grade teacher, Vanessa Zanin, who started Greenbelt Elementary's program four years ago, picked up its allotted 3,000 from Living Classrooms.

But the school got a surprise visit a short time later when Rochelle Walker, of Living Classrooms, arrived with an additional 2,000 eggs in desperate need of an oxygenated hatchery, and their time was running out.

The foundation had taxied the eggs to the Greenbelt area on Sunday night, May 1, about a week prior to the fry’s release. Greenbelt Elementary and other participating schools had only until the wee hours of Monday morning to pick them up — or the shad would begin to die.

Sidwell Friends School didn't make the window, Hancock explained. That’s how Greenbelt Elementary ended up with 5,000 shad eggs to divide among its three fourth-grade classrooms, taught by Stephanie Katz, Molly Simms and Hancock.

“Last week I had 2,000 babies and 25 children” Hancock said.

“We had to keep the water temperature at about 65 degrees Fahrenheit,” she continued, recalling how vigilantly her students took care of their charges — frequently asking to check the water’s temperature and working hard to keep it even.

“The best part was Thursday, when the eggs were beginning to hatch,” she said. “It was so rewarding to listen to the excitement in their voices.”

As her students began to handle the shad, their reaction was “Ooh, it’s gross. Oh I like it,” Hancock said, sounding a bit like the opening to “A Tale of Two Cities."

When Patch visited the school that Thursday, the millimeter-ish fry zipped back and forth with a seeming eagerness, matched only by Hancock’s fourth graders, who were nearing the completion of their environmental quest.

For some, it wasn’t their first shad encounter. On April 17, during spring break, fourth-graders Ana Fernandez-Napp, Ashley Gonzalez and Sebastian Fernandez Napp journeyed to the Potomac River along with Hancock and Simms, who took them by car and boat to meet with Jim Cummins, director for Living Resources of the Interstate Commission on the Potomac River Basin. Together they netted American shad, and Cummins harvested their eggs and sperm.

Armed with a vision for their deed reaching far beyond the fish world, the three students displayed admirable fortitude, not returning to Greenbelt until 11:30 p.m.

Although, on Wednesday, friends of the school will get a chance to hear more about Greenbelt Elmentary's fourth-grade class project, the students' own bright shining day came that Friday on May 6, when about 75 of them descended on the Anacostia River along with Hancock, Simms, Katz and Zanin.

Each fourth-grader got their own cup of fry, and on “three,” they released the squirming young shad into the river under sunny skies. As a result, the shad are likely to return there when it's their time to spawn.

“I’m proud that we actually impacted the environment in a positive way — not just reading, not just writing, but hands on,” Hancock said, “They’ll remember this their entire lives.”