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by Hayley Lundberg
Individual Giving Officer
at The Children's Museum of Indianapolis
Our mission at The Children’s Museum is to ignite joy, wonder, and curiosity by creating powerful learning experiences for children and adults. Today, we want to share a wonderful experience from 2024 Paleontology Summer Intern Jayce Jones.
Recently, I had the pleasure of talking with our paleo team about their most recent dig trip to The Jurassic Mile® in Wyoming. They shared some fascinating finds, but they couldn’t stop raving about their amazing intern Jayce. He had the opportunity to attend the final two weeks of the dig, an experience made possible by the generous support of our donors.
Jayce is incredibly grateful and amazed by his experience this summer. As a paleo intern, he saw his dreams come to life in ways he’d never imagined. He field jacketed dinosaur bones, 3-D scanned and cleaned fossils, and visited other museums to see their dinosaur and fossil collections while he was in Wyoming. While onsite at The Children's Museum, he helped our paleo team with fossil prep work, communicated with the public, completed collections and database work, contributed to academic research, and gained professional experience in a lab environment. Most importantly, he learned how to be part of a team, be kind, be a good researcher, and practice ethical collecting.
“I am part of the lucky few that get to do this. This internship has been the best experience of my life, full stop. I am literally living my dream job already. I am getting to do the coolest stuff, and I get paid for it?”
—Jayce Jones
As we approach our 100-year anniversary in 2025, Jayce is an amazing example of how our museum continues to inspire generations. He grew up coming to the museum, his dreams ignited volunteering at the museum, and then his dreams came alive through our amazing intern program, dedicated staff and our museum mission and vision igniting Jayce’s dreams to realize his potential in this world. Your support has forever impacted Jayce, allowing his passions to become reality.
Jayce is now more confident than ever but knows there is always more to learn. You can see Jayce down in the Polly H. Hix Paleo Lab in Dinosphere® each week.
Stop by and say hi!
You can help support our mission through our intern program and annual dig trips. Your contributions help make these transformative experiences possible. Together, we can continue to ignite dreams and inspire future generations. Donate today and be a part of making dreams come alive!
