You know what would be really neat?

[lyquidphyre]

My boyfriends sister teaches dance at a HS and she wants to work during the summer.. and she was talking about teaching dance at a community college with the adult continuing education program
And you know what I thought would be the neatest thing?
To be able to teach, to people who want to learn, how to keep/take care of FW fish!
This is just me day dreaming but if there was a class that met once or maybe twice a week and the requirements are like.. having a 5, 10, 20 or 29gal tank. And then, I was thinking if you made a deal with a LFS saying.. if you can give my students a discount, I will ask/inform/require them to buy everything at your store. And if the person wasn't happy with their tank, they could sell it back to me or something....
Anyways... there is so much stuff you could talk about!
Cycling, treated ich/diseases, fish selection, plants, etc etc etc

Gosh, that would be so be so neat!

 

[draX]

Sounds like a great idea! I hate it when people decide they want a fishtank, and just go to a petshop and buy whatever takes their fancy. No research, no knowledge...And they end up with a 10 gallon stocked with 20 tetra's and a clown loach. Wish I had more time available...would love to do this.

 

[lyquidphyre]

Hehe the more i think about it, the more I want to do it!

Fish keeping is something Im passionate about (ha, like ya'll couldn't guess that already) and i don't want to work in a fish store cuz it wouldn't be teaching.

And I don't see why a local, privatly owned fishstore wouldn't... help me out.. if I were to say "if you were to give me a discount on 10gals, I will have my students come in and purchase your fish" and take a field trip or something ya know? Cuz if im promoting their store to X amount of people, they will make a profit

Im seriously gunna look into it

 

[BrianNY]

My wife taught a course on the Travel Industry as a business in the continuing ed program at a local college a few years back. Basically she was partners with the school and merely paid them for the use of the facility.

She had the added responsibility of advertising for students, preparing the curriculum, and gathering texts and reference materials. It isn't as easy as it sounds. Still, she enjoyed it and even managed turning a profit.

I't a cool idea Katy. Just wondering what kind of enrollment you'd expect?

 

[lyquidphyre]

She had to pay them to teach? What I was reading is you either get paid hourly, or by percentage.... hmmm

Gosh, enrollment would be the hardest thing... and would take a lot of advertising. Lets say I was able to do this at UTA in Arlington... I could advertise at PTA meetings in the arlington area and maybe a few surrounding cities, in HS programs (like the little pampletts people make for the choir/dance/band concerts), at the college itself (prolly more so in the biology/science buildings), local fishstores and maybe even online at places like livejournal (im already apart of the dfwtx community). I could even turn it into "10 things you need to know before buying your children an aquarium" or something along those lines.

Also, another thing you should keep in mind is I am going to the teaching field anyways.. so preparing curriculum, gathering text and teaching is what I yearn to do in general. Besides, think of all the material ive got right here!!
Haha.. you will see posts like "Hey guys, what should I teach tonight" ha, jp!

 

[smallfry]

My suggestion is to narrow down your "target students" and taylor the content of your "course" accordingly. As we all know there's soooooooo much to teach people about aquarium care....it would be impossible to cover it all with one course. But as your tentative title suggests, it's best to narrow down the topic...have fun!

 

[lyquidphyre]

Well, a continuing education class would be once a week for X amount of weeks

Or I was thinking about this (this goes back to me thinking too much)-
I remember when i was little I would get these little flyers from teachers for different seminars/PTA meetings whatever and i would aaaaaaaaaaalways try and talk her into doing it (ha, she never did).. but lets say *assuming I had the go-head with the principle* I did a seminar that was $10 and about an hour- hour and a half long that covers the important stuff and make a flyer to be handed out during class- do you know how many kids would run home and beg their parents for an aquarium??
And even if 5 parents showed up.. that'd be $50

My whole thought process behind this is I want to do something im passionate about, which is teaching, over a topic im passionate about, which is fish keeping.

My friend says its more like "a topic im psyco about"
hehe