An animal educator teaches others about animals, as well as often trains animals and helps them learn something or become accustomed to their environment. If you worked in a zoo, you’d teach visitors about the animals at the zoo and promote conservation efforts. You might also be involved in training the animals. Animal educators often work in amusement parks that have animals as well as zoos.
This job typically requires a master’s degree or above. Most communities have many animal-educator jobs because it’s so specific that it can be hard to fill the positions. However, if you know a lot about animals due to your experience and self-education, you can also start your own business as an animal educator.
Specialize
The first thing you’ll want to do is figure out what type of education you wish to provide to the public. Do you want to teach children about the proper way to care for cats, dogs, and typical household pets, or do you want to demonstrate and show reptiles to kids and teach them about those?
Master Public Speaking
You’ll need to get comfortable talking to a lot of people in public, since most of the time your presentations will be to a group of people rather than one-on-one. Having said that, you can also become the next Jackson Galaxy and help people learn to live with their evil cats for a fee.
Set Up Your Website and Online Presence
Today, no matter what type of business you start, you really do need a website. Set up a page that explains and demonstrates what you do so that people will know what to expect when they book with you. Make it possible to book right on the site and schedule the event. That way the site provides info and onboards new clients.
Work with Preschools and Daycares
One way to find clients is to develop your program to educate children who go to daycare and preschool about animals. You can literally set up almost any sort of program like this because daycares and preschools are desperate for activities that don’t cost much per head to deliver to their students.
Work with Afterschool Programs
Another place to market your educational programs is to afterschool programs. Providing a discounted experience for the kids is very lucrative when you work with these programs directly.
Teach the Public How to Be Humane to Animals
Another thing you can do is choose to teach the public about being humane to animals. You can host workshops and more to demonstrate to the public the information that you will share with them about treating animals the way they need to be treated, based on their type.
Set Up Educational Seminars for Animal Lovers
You can also set up big education seminars designed to teach pet lovers or animal lovers about the pets you’re an expert on. You might even want to teach the public about local wildlife, or birds, or insects too.
Becoming an animal educator is a fantastic way to get involved in your community as well as earn money. Again, you will want to set up a website to display your programs so that people can sign up to participate.
