The latest edition of DEP's Teaching Green environmental education newsletter features a collection of success stories about local education projects funded through DEP's Environmental Education Grant Program.
Since the grant program began in 1993, DEP has provided more than $11 million in funding to schools, municipalities, and community organizations for environmental education projects in Pennsylvania.
The program is funded by a portion of the fines and penalties collected for environmental violations by DEP.
Other Features
Also featured in this edition of Teaching Green is--
-- Newest Falcons Soar The Skies In Harrisburg
-- How To Create A Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience
-- Help Your Community Understand Stream Maintenance Regulations
-- Join The New Environmental Education Providers Inventory
-- Workshops And Training Opportunities For Educators
-- New Environmental Education Program Coordinator Joins The Center: Lisa Meadows
Success Stories
Here are just a few of the success stories--
-- Getting Everyone in on Stream Water Quality Data
By Dr. Holly Travis, Western PA Watershed Collaboration Project, Indiana University of Pennsylvania
This fall the Western PA Watershed Collaboration Project, based at IUP, begins its second year of monitoring streams in the Stoney Run watershed in Indiana County. Our goals are to develop student scientists and watershed-smart citizens and help get local streams off the impaired-status list by doing so.
Elementary, secondary, and college students, in partnership with IUP faculty and grad students, will monitor biological and chemical water quality, flow rates, stormwater events, and the impact of remediation projects. They’ll submit the data to a shared database and perform data analysis.
Not only does this project provide hands-on meaningful watershed education experiences, but the data inform policy discussions by local governments and environmental organizations, as participants share stream assessment findings with community groups through the Stormwater Education Partnership.
We’ve also held two Act 48 teacher workshops to develop a standards-based curriculum, and a third one this fall will see these classroom materials completed, incorporating new water quality lesson plans into the local school curriculum.
-- Enabling Students to Create Safe Green Spaces
By Rachel Bowers, Grounded Strategies, Pittsburgh
Green Playces: Student Ambassadors is an in-school program that works with Allegheny County secondary students to transform vacant and underused land on or near their school grounds into safe and creative places.
In the 2017-2018 school year, student ambassadors in two fifth-grade classes at Twin Rivers Intermediate School in McKeesport transformed an unused courtyard space into a meditative space, with outdoor seating that observes a landscaped area with native pollinator plants.
Fifteen students at Propel Andrew Street High School in Homestead transformed a vacant lot that is home to the school's beekeeping class and apiary. They chose to make the space more community-oriented by adding seating and gathering spaces, as well as to celebrate the bees with a bee-themed mural and pollinator gardens.
Through Green Playces projects, students learn the process of designing, planning, and building green spaces for their school community. They examine environmental justice issues, such as land use, air quality, and water quality, and are introduced to the green economy. Students leave the program with the tools to engage their community with a deeper understanding of environmental justice issues.
-- Teaching Deep Local Connections to Climate Change
By Diane Motel, Wildlands Conservancy, Emmaus
Through the “Climate Change in Our Watershed” project, the Wildlands Conservancy provided place-based climate education to middle school teachers and students to help them develop a deep, local connection to environmental issues and the skills and knowledge to create personally relevant collective actions.
Using Project Learning Tree’s Climate Change training, we provided a professional development workshop to classroom teachers and naturalists. We delivered watershed-focused climate change programs to over 500 middle school students, having groups rotate through 5 stations: climate change 101, a topo map/augmented reality box (Facebook), an eco-chamber lab, a local effects hike, and a citizen science lab. We addressed the climate change literacy challenge by weaving a social media component through this STEM-centered project focused on personal efficacy.
Click Here for a copy of DEP’s Teaching Green. Have questions and suggestions? Contact Bert Myers, Director of DEP’s Environmental Education and Information Center, by sending email to gimyers@pa.gov.
Related Stories:
Delaware River Watershed Initiative: Clean Water, Healthy Fish, Happy Kids In Chester County
Delaware River Watershed Initiative: Clean Water, Healthy Fish, Happy Kids In Chester County
CBF-PA: 16 Student Groups In 6 Counties To Participate In Fall Susquehanna Watershed Environmental Education Program
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