Passport to Texas

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program

Archery is a sport where physical size and agility is not required to excel.

If you were a petite little fourth grader, you could shoot at the same time as the high school jock and you may win. So, it’s said that it is the only sport where boys and girls can compete at the same time on the same team.

Burnie Kessner is archery coordinator for Texas Parks and Wildlife. He says archery levels the playing field for kids of all abilities.

Physical ability doesn’t even matter. A young man at our state tournament last year had Down’s Syndrome; he was on the shooting line with everybody else. At the national tournament, there was a young man who was visually impaired on the shooting line with everyone else who was not visually impaired. And, the only difference was, he had a sighted person standing a little behind him, giving him the cues, “a little higher, a little lower, left, right, shoot.” So, it’s an even playing field, and that’s one of the fundamentals of this program, is that the equipment is standardized. Everybody has the same equipment.

The Texas National Archery in Schools program certifies teachers in a one-day intensive class to teach the sport to students of all ages and abilities. Learn how to get involved when you log onto passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… our series receives support from the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration programProgram…working to increase fishing, hunting, shooting and boating opportunities in Texas…For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Archery in Schools, Part 3 of 3 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program

The Texas National Archery in the Schools Program certifies teachers as instructors. Teachers learn the program, as they will teach it to their students.

It’s an all day workshop to become a certified instructor. They learn with the same equipment and the same method.

Burnie Kessner is archery coordinator for Texas Parks and Wildlife.

We use international style archery. It’s bulls-eye target faces, Olympic size. We use Olympic whistle commands, and they learn the same way worldwide.

Kessner says while certified instructors prepare students for tournaments, the successes a child
experiences extend beyond the bulls-eye.

So, when a kid is shooting archery, and they’re on the shooting line—they’re all the same. So, it doesn’t matter what kind of home they go home to after the tournament, when they’re at the tournament, they’re the same as everyone else. So, that’s the self-esteem building piece; it’s standardized.

Archery is a sport where anyone of nearly any ability can participate…and we have more about that tomorrow.

That’s our show… our series receives support from the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program…working to increase fishing, hunting, shooting and boating opportunities in Texas…For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Archery in Schools, Part 2 of 3 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife and the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program

Archery, the original shooting sport, is making a comeback in schools nationwide. Burnie Kessner is archery coordinator for Texas Parks and Wildlife.

Ninety-five percent of my job is, I’d say, is coordinating the archery in the schools program—The Texas National Archery in the Schools Program.

Forty-five states currently participate in The National Archery in the Schools program. Texas joined in 2004 to become the seventeenth state.

We got some schools on board in oh-five, and we really kicked off officially in February of oh-six with our first state tournament where we had a hundred and twenty kids. Our second state tournament was last February oh-seven, where we had almost four hundred kids.

And this spring the third tournament is expected to draw more than five hundred participants…which begs the question: what is it about archery that sees tournament involvement continually climb?

Schools are finding out all of the benefits and the great assets of having this program. It’s very inclusive. It doesn’t matter your gender, your physical ability doesn’t matter, your size doesn’t matter. As long as you can learn the process, as long as you can learn the process you can do archery and you can excel.

We’ll have more on the Archery in the Schools Program tomorrow.

That’s our show… our series receives support from the Sport Fish and Wildlife Restoration Program…working to increase fishing, hunting, shooting and boating opportunities in Texas…For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Archery in Schools, Part 1 of 3 Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

Texas Amphibian Watch wants to make sure Texas always has healthy populations of frogs and toads.

Texas Amphibian Watch is one of our citizen science programs. That means that we are involving everyday Texas citizens in gathering data. And in this case we’re looking at amphibians, a group of species that are in a lot of trouble worldwide.

Lee Ann Linam coordinates the Texas Amphibian Watch program. It’s easy to get involved.

People can pick up a packet of monitoring materials that we offer for free, and they can purchase a CD of frog and toad calls. It has nearly all the frogs and toads in Texas, to learn your frog and toad calls. And then you can actually choose your own place that you want to monitor, and go out and begin recording data.

With a state as big as Texas, the program only has eighty volunteers, and needs more.

East Texas is an area that’s very rich in frog and toad species, yet, we don’t have too many volunteers from that area. South Texas is a place where Texas has some very interesting species that we share with Mexico, and we’d like to keep better track of what’s going on with them. And then, you have to be in the right place at the right time, but we certainly need more volunteers from West Texas.

We have links where you can download monitoring forms at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Texas Amphibian Watch Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Passport to Texas from Texas Parks and Wildlife

According to the Chinese horoscope, 2008 is the year of the rat. However, as far as the Association of Zoos and Aquaria is concerned, it’s the year of the frog.

That doesn’t appear on any zodiac calendars that you’ll look at. But it is a leap year. And so maybe it’s a good year for us to recognize what’s going on with amphibians around the world.

Lee Ann Linam coordinates the Texas Amphibian Watch program. According to a recent study, amphibian species are declining worldwide, with 122 species considered extinct.

And so, these zoos and aquaria are asking their bodies to get involved in terms of being ready to save some of these populations in zoos. And, we’re asking Texans to be involved by keeping an eye on what’s going on with amphibians around them, so that we’ll know if there are species that are in trouble, and if there are things that we should do to help before it gets to that point.

If you want to help amphibians, go to the zoo.

In this year of the frog, people might want to look at what their zoos are doing to create more awareness about amphibians. Many of them are actually fundraising so that a zoo can take on the captive breeding of some of these species that are about to disappear in the wild.

Help monitor the health of amphibians. Find out how at passporttotexas.org.

That’s our show… For Texas Parks and Wildlife…I’m Cecilia Nasti.

Leap Year: Year of the Frog Play Now | Play in Popup | Download