Boy, 9, gets school to ban frog dissection

Nine-year-old Gabriel Cruz dreaded his school's fourth-grade frog dissection since learning about it last year from his older brother.

He told his teacher at the private Ivy League School in Smithtown that he wouldn't participate.

But the shy, soft-spoken Gabriel didn't stop there. He didn't want anyone else to do it, either. Using research he received from the Save the Frogs! charity and conservation group that some frogs used in dissections come from the wild, he pleaded his case to his teacher, and his parents spoke on his behalf to the school principal.

The result: School officials enacted a schoolwide ban on the practice.

"I didn't want to do it," he said, sitting at his kitchen table. "I like frogs. I didn't feel that it was right."

Gabriel, who owns two African dwarf frogs, wears frog T-shirts to class and even corrects his teacher when she misidentifies the classroom's two fire-bellied toads.

"Remember," he tells her when she calls them frogs, "toads are bumpy."

Gabriel's teacher, Lucille Capobianco, said she was moved by his earnestness.

"I truly respect Gabe's feelings," she said. "He is a frog fanatic. He would always come in to class and give us facts about frogs."

She even donated $25 to Save the Frogs! on Gabriel's behalf. "He is a great student, top of the class, a wonderful boy," she said.

The Smithtown school went through with this year's dissection Monday because the plan was already in place, but promised to use only computer simulations in the future.

Gabriel, of Nesconset, said he was proud of his accomplishment and that he's learned an important lesson.

"Everybody's opinion counts," he said.

The national debate over dissection in schools came to the fore in 1987, when a California teen sued her school district for not allowing her to complete an alternative project. The case ultimately was settled and some schools eventually started using computerized means of dissection.

But some educators think students who use virtual labs are missing out on an important educational experience.

Doug Schmid is the program administrator of the outdoor environmental education program at Western Suffolk BOCES. Students in his program dissect clams, fish, owl pellets and even seals that have died of natural causes.

"Virtual labs are increasing in popularity, but our staff believes they don't provide nearly the same experience," he said. "There is a lot of sensory information that you don't get when you do virtual labs. I don't know educationally if they are the best way to go."

John O'Farrell, science chairman for Half Hollow Hills school district, was among several local administrators who said his district has been relying less on dissection as the years go by. "We have always treated dissection as something teachers can elect to do or not to do," he said.

Students in Eastport South Manor complete frog dissections in the anatomy and physiology classes. The Middle Country district uses frog dissections for enrichment purposes, though they are not part of the regular curriculum. Students can opt out of the lesson at both districts.

With Michael R. Ebert

and Erin Geismar