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Richard Moyer

King College students do not have to leave campus to enjoy many wonders of nature. With a walk of less than a minute from most buildings on campus, they can experience the beauty of stately trees, a glistening spring, and scampering woodland creatures in the 25-acre King Forest.

“King Forest and the academic areas of our campus often overlap without our notice,” Dr. Moyer, professor of biology says. “Those fortunate enough to see the red fox passing through campus, or groundhogs waddling along campus sidewalks before hibernation, catch a glimpse of how much these two worlds intersect. Part of my job is to bring these two worlds together in an intentional way.”

Dr. Moyer helps students merge these two worlds by taking them out of the four-walled classrooms of White Hall and into King Forest. As part of their biology laboratory class, they experience the sights, smells and sounds of nature, firsthand.

“We never know what we'll find, but King Forest teaches us to look and listen," Dr. Moyer says. “We’re endowed with multiple senses, but most of our learning uses only one or two of these. We don’t know what animals we’ll hear or handle during class or lab, or what plants may offer us something to taste. Touch, smell and taste are powerful learning tools, ones we often ignore.”

Dr. Moyer and his students utilize all their senses as he leads hands-on lessons. As part of the lab, students have eaten bitternut hickory nuts, observed a sunning garter snake and giant puffball mushrooms, all while exploring the biochemistry of leaf color changes.

“Earning an ‘A’ in a course is the most obvious reward structure in an academic setting,” he says, “Yet, a meaningful life requires much broader skills.”

Using hand tools to remove brush, planting trees together, or climbing a tree to mount a birdhouse are just a few of the lessons students have learned in his lab. They’ve also uprooted, then recycled privet bushes into brush piles in the woods and lake for animal habitat, mounted bird and bat houses, and managed wetland sites for amphibian reproduction.