About the Network

The Advancing Conservation through Empathy for Wildlife (ACE for Wildlife™) Network, founded and led by Woodland Park Zoo’s Advancing Empathy Initiative, facilitates the sharing of knowledge, experiences, and data to drive conservation change through fostering empathy for animals and the environment that sustains them.

We are a collaborative learning network of hundreds of zoo and aquarium professionals, spanning various roles and departments from education to zookeeping to communications.

What do we offer?

Joining the ACE for Wildlife Network is an opportunity to share knowledge, build professional skills, and work in coordination with a community of peers who are motivated by empathy for wildlife. Network participants are able to access many benefits, from support and training for professional growth, to a national platform that allows staff and volunteers at zoos and aquariums of all sizes to influence their field through the innovative work that they are piloting.

Two ACE for Wildlife Network members at our conference.

Community

The ACE for Wildlife Network is a highly collaborative community where lessons learned are openly shared. Participants benefit from the collective knowledge and expertise of the Network.

Zoo professional holding a scull

Resources

Being part of the Network gives you access to techniques, tools, and resources vetted by staff members at accredited zoos and aquariums, which can help you integrate empathy practices into your visitor experiences.

Professional woman speaking at the ACE for Wildlife Network conference

Career growth

We can support your professional development and learning at every stage, offering help with networking, public speaking, program design, and more.  

A zoo staff member with brown hair, glasses, and a blue vest smiles at the camera.

Who can participate?

We invite individuals who are interested in becoming more involved to join the Network as an Affiliate - or as a Member if you already work or volunteer for a Network Partner Organization. Joining gives you access to an online Network discussion board, our resource library, and invitations to attend events such as our annual Empathy Summit.

Photo credit: Henry Vilas Zoo.

  • “The ACE for Wildlife Network helps to facilitate discussions surrounding how we talk about conservation. Sometimes these conversations get left behind in our individual organizations, but as a community of practice we can push these conversations further.”

    ACE for Wildlife Network Member

  • “I appreciate that the network has given me the opportunity to learn and connect with other people from small zoos in my region who have similar structures, similar projects, and face similar challenges.”

    ACE for Wildlife Network Member

  • “The network is really flexible and spans a wide array of topics on how to implement empathy. From education, to zookeepers, to marketing and communication – all departments can benefit from becoming involved or at least learning more!”

    ACE for Wildlife Network Member

  • “The Empathy Summit will help your organization to create connections with your guests and animals in more meaningful ways. This will give us more support in our communities.”

    ACE for Wildlife Network Member

  • “What makes me most excited about the future of the Network is the idea that there are just so many different people that are energized about the idea of using empathy as a resource and as a tool. And the idea that the Network is able to really leverage that scale of diversity, and the many different types of organizations, is going to mean that we’re going to have such a more robust set of tools and a much more robust future for all our programming and for all the experiences we’re able to offer our guests.”

    Daniel Rother, Woodland Park Zoo

  • “One of my favorite things about the Network is the amount of collaboration that we get to do with different organizations. As a relatively small zoo, I just think it’s really fascinating to find everyone else’s stories, their experiences, to learn that we’re not alone in different aspects. And then, all of the sharing that we get to do as we create new resources—it’s really exciting.”

    Tierney Ball, Zoo Boise

Visit www.aceforwildlife.org or email us at empathy@zoo.org to learn more.

Explore more

The open eye of an animal with scaly skin is seen in close up.