Lobster College: An Expeditionary Learning Vacation Offered by UMaine’s Lobster Institute
Contact: Cathy Billings at (207) 581-2751
ORONO — It’s time to roll up your sleeves and don your Sou’wester hat for this year’s Lobster College, offered by the University of Maine’s Lobster Institute and scheduled for Sept. 17-19, 2009 in Boothbay, Maine.
“With expeditionary learning, we take the old-fashioned field trip to a whole new level,” says Cathy Billings, associate director of the Lobster Institute. “Lobster College is the ultimate in hands-on, community-based learning, disguised as a vacation. It is designed for the layperson who is interested in enjoying a fun, extended weekend on the Maine coast and a chance to learn everything and anything there is to know about Maine’s premier crustacean.”
Home base for Lobster College will be the Kenniston Hill Inn Bed & Breakfast. Participants will enjoy the gracious hospitality of host Dianne Ward at this classic shipbuilders mansion built in 1786 in spectacular Boothbay, Maine.
Various field trips are scheduled throughout the Schoodic Peninsula and Frenchman Bay area as part of the curriculum. “Folks who join us for Lobster College will experience hands-on and on-site learning about lobsters directly from lobstermen and lobster dealers themselves, as well as from University of Maine faculty,” says Robert Bayer, executive director of the Lobster Institute. “We’ll be taking a trip on a lobster boat to see how traps are hauled, we’ll visit a working lobster wharf, and we’ll provide lectures on a variety of lobster-related topics – including a culinary workshop. And of course, there will be plenty of lobster to eat. At our last Lobster College graduation, we counted them up and found that we had enjoyed ten different lobster dishes during the course of the weekend.”
Just a few slots remain for those interested in enrolling in this unique learning vacation. According to Billings, the registration deadline is Sept. 5.
“We should fill up quickly though,” she says. “There is a diverse group of enrollees so far, with people coming from such places as Missouri, Illinois, and Massachusetts. ”
In addition to being an educational program, Lobster College doubles as a fundraiser for the Lobster Institute’s operating fund. The Lobster Institute is a research and outreach organization with a mission of protecting, conserving and enhancing the vitality of the lobster resource and lobstering as an industry…and as a way of life. It was founded jointly by members of the lobster industry and faculty from the University of Maine. The Institute links industry expertise with academic resources to solve problems and challenges facing the lobster fishery.
While participants won’t need SATs to get in, enrollment for Lobster College is limited to the first 20 “students” and the deadline to enroll is Sept. 5. Tuition is $575 per person (including all lobster meals) and room rates range from $140-$180 per night. Information about Lobster College, including cost and how to register, as well as information on other programs and services of the Lobster Institute, is available at www.lobsterinstitute.org or by calling (207)581-2751 or (207)581-1443.