BioPark Docents

Docents are volunteer teachers at the Zoo, Aquarium or Botanic Garden. They introduce visitors to the amazing diversity of life, help them see how everything is connected and encourage everyday conservation.

After a semester-long training, docents can do many different volunteer jobs, depending on personal interests. All BioPark docents have opportunities to...

• Share favorite parts of the BioPark through guided tours or informal mini-tours.
• Help visitors explore nature using exhibits and hands-on biofacts such as education animals, animal pelts, shark skin, urchin spines, tree rings or insect specimens.
• Take the BioPark on the road! Visit local classrooms through outreach programs.
• Get free regular admission to the BioPark facilities and the inside scoop on new exhibits.
• Attend continuing education classes led by experts in zoology, botany, marine biology, veterinary medicine, ecology and more!

If you choose to become a Zoo Docent, you can...

• Travel around New Mexico on the Zoo To You van teaching about animals and conservation.
• Introduce Albuquerque-area children and adults to the animal kingdom through local outreach programs.
• Walk a llama or porcupine and give Zoo visitors the chance to meet them up close! Education demonstration animals include llamas, alpacas, an African crested porcupine, prehensile-tailed porcupine, serval, kestrel, macaw, marine toad, bullsnake and more!

If you choose to become a Garden Docent, you can...

• Introduce visitors to the flora of Baja, South Africa, Chile or Greece inside the Desert and Mediterranean Conservatories.
• Answer the question, "Why do we need plants?" and teach about plants that provide food, shelter, clothing and medicine.
• Get your hands dirty! Involve visitors in hands-on gardening experiences.
• Travel through time with visitors at the 1920s-1930s era Heritage Farm. Demonstrate wool working, quilting, canning and cooking.
• Teach about invertebrates using butterflies, millipedes, Madagascar hissing cockroaches, tarantulas and scorpions.

If you choose to become an Aquarium Docent, you can...

• Reveal our connections to the sea! New Mexico may be landlocked, but you can teach Aquarium visitors about how we affect the health of the ocean and how its health affects us.
• Explore river, salt marsh, coral reef and open ocean habitats and share with visitors along the way.
• Help find flounders! Assist visitors with spotting and identifying animals in the Aquarium tanks.
• Give visitors hands-on experiences they won't forget at the Touchpool and Shark & Ray Encounter. A mini-touchpool travels to local schools as part of Aquarium outreach programs.
• Explain why the sharks don't bother the divers during the daily feedings at the Ocean Tank. Narrate as divers feed animals and clean the tanks. Share information about sharks, eels, stingrays, porcupine fish and more!

What's Next?

I'm interested in becoming a docent and want to learn more...

• Read the full Docent Job Description
• Attend the Volunteer Orientation on Thursday, August 6 at 11:00am in the Colores Building at the Zoo. Tell the Zoo cashier you are here for the volunteer orientation to gain admittance.
• Call (505)764-6214 or email biopark@cabq.gov to speak with someone in the Education Department.

I'm ready to sign up!

• Read the full Docent Job Description
• Fill out the Volunteer Information Form and either
  • Bring your paperwork to the Volunteer Orientation on August 6. You will be able to purchase a training manual and begin reading before the first day of class.

    or

  • Come to the first day of training on Thursday, August 13 at 9:30am in the Colores Education Building at the Zoo. Bring the completed application with you or be prepared to fill it out that day.

I'd like to volunteer, but maybe not as a docent...

• Read about other Volunteer Opportunities at the BioPark.
• Attend the Volunteer Orientation on August 6 at no obligation to find out more and talk with Education staff and active volunteers.

Return to Volunteer Programs