More than 1,700 elementary students across 40 schools in the Grande Prairie region released newly hatched butterflies into the world this week.
Recently, the International Paper Grande Prairie Mill, through the International Paper Foundation provided thousands of Peace Country youth with “butterfly kits” to bolster hands-on learning in Grande Prairie area schools.
Schools in the Public, Catholic, County, and French school districts received their kits containing larvae in May, granting students the opportunity to witness metamorphosis in real time over the course of three weeks, which Grande Prairie Mill Manager Lyman Rorem says supports engaging education among youth in the region.
“We hope it inspires a curiosity to learn more through educational activities such as the butterfly kits,” they say.
The Painted Lady butterflies were taken care of for a number of weeks by students as they began to hatch and were fed for nearly a week before students got the chance to release them into the wild.
International Paper’s school butterfly kit program operates throughout North America in schools across Canada, the US, and Mexico, allowing students to witness the biological miracle of metamorphosis in their backyard.
