The PA Resources Council was recently awarded a grant of $50,000 from The Boeing Company to continue the successful Stream Stewards hands-on watershed education program through the 2017–2018 school year.

The program, sponsored by Boeing since 2014, is a partnership between PRC and the Eastern Delaware County Stormwater Collaborative and focuses on the importance of protecting local waterways through in-class and field trip lessons.

During the program, students participate in a multi-session educational experience that combines classroom lessons with real-world science through field trips to local streams.

Classroom sessions focus on the water cycle and freshwater ecology and how they are impacted by nonpoint source pollution, such and fertilizers and pesticides.

Students then travel outside to local streams for hands-on learning with trained environmental scientists, conducting water chemistry tests and ecological sampling for macroinvertebrate species which are indicators of stream health.

This field experience offers concrete evidence of the relationship between water quality and aquatic life, connects students to the natural world, and opens students’ eyes to how scientists work.

To date, nearly 3,000 students have participated in the program. This year’s funding will allow the Stream Stewards program to be expanded into additional school districts, and also provides for the creation of a teacher’s curriculum companion of follow-up lessons.

Through the curriculum companion and accompanying student workbook, teachers will be able to integrate the concepts presented through the Stream Stewards program throughout the rest of the school year.

For more information on programs, initiatives and special events, visit the PA Resources Council website.  Click Here to sign up for regular updates, follow PRC on Twitter or Like them on Facebook.  Click Here for PRC’s Events Calendar.  Click Here to support their work.

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(Reprinted from the November PA Resources Council newsletter.  Click Here to sign up for your own copy.)

[Posted: Nov. 8, 2017]

11/13/2017