Madison Barksdale - Instructor

May 27
2 min read

Madison Barksdale is an outdoor educator who teaches students to see insects as both a survival resource and a meaningful connection to the natural world.

Her work centers on hands-on observation, ethical collection, and understanding how insects can provide nourishment, knowledge, and awareness in outdoor settings.

Madison emphasizes respect, helping students build confidence while developing a deeper appreciation for the role insects play in sustaining and connecting us to our environment.

She believes that teaching our younger generations the topic of Entomology and Entomophagy is of the utmost importance as we all continue to create a

healthier and safer world.

Qualifications

3+ Years Earth Education Experience
2+ years of teaching experience.
Wilderness First Responder
Background Check Passed
Fingerprinted

🎉Year of Joining: 2026

📅Availability: Fridays, Saturdays

Expertise

Insect identification/ Entomophagy/ primitive tool use/using symbiotic relationship identifications to make environmental and survival decisions.

Experience

Dr. Shawn Clark (curator of insect collections) made space in the laboratory for one little volunteer among many enthusiastic college students at Brigham Young University. Ten year old Madison was allowed to come and go from the lab at all hours of the day, washing insect vials, pinning insects, organizing insects from non-insects, studying the thousands upon thousands of collections created by students and professors. She was even invited to numerous insect collection outings all around Utah. In the first few months, she started her own collection, and began with two weevil beetles she discovered in her mothers rice bin. Today they read- 'collected age 11- 2006.

Madison was easily led away from her interest in reptiles, sharks, whales, large cats, gorillas.

"All animals are amazing" she admits, "but INSECTS. Insects are just too incredible, and they should be studied by everyone."

Here is why-

Madison is 32 now, and she has collected from all around the world, adding onto a display fit for a museum. Her goal is to use this collection to teach, not just about Entomology (the study of insects), but Entomophagy (the practice of EATING insects). She believes that by using this practice, students will learn how much fespect insects truly deserve. They have not only kept us fed and alive through our human existence, but have been the ultimate healers of our ecosystems, using all their stages of eveution to balance all other classes of animals. They are what keeps our world breathing, and we need them more than any other class of animal there has ever been and will ever be.