Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
pact their efforts have made. It is their legacy to the school, a giving back to the
land . . . an accomplishment that deserves celebration! (Karla Dunham, un-
published, 2009)
The idea of using restoration to advance environmental education is also alive in
Heston, Kansas, where, from 2005 to 2010, the Dyke Arboretum of the Plains has in-
volved more than one hundred teachers from thirty schools. Brad Guhr (unpub-
lished, 2009), education coordinator for the arboretum, writes, “Children delight in
planting and watching prairie plants grow. Teachers say that EPS feeds their soul. Ad-
ministrators report that EPS energizes their staff. And the butterflies don't seem to
mind either . . . and agree that prairie plantings are good for school grounds—a move-
ment that is gaining momentum in south-central Kansas.”
An example of a regional effort is the Great Lakes Earth Partnership—a program
building on the environmental education opportunities of Lake Superior, Green Bay,
and the Milwaukee River. In Phase I, lead teams from all three locales canoed the
Milwaukee River; mucked for macroinvertebrates; visited green and conventional
sewerage and water treatment operations, farms, and living roofs; mapped school-
yards; visited and designed rain gardens; tested water; participated in a beach clean-
up; kayaked two of Lake Superior's String of Pearls estuaries; boated through the Kak-
agon River wild rice sloughs hosted by the Bad River Tribe; visited fish hatcheries and
farms; tested soils at three watershed elevations; learned aspects of Ojibway language
and culture; and experienced a fish count on Bay City Creek. Hosts and collaborators
include the Chequamegon National Forest; Apostle Islands National Lakeshore; Bay-
field, Washburn, Ashland, and Milwaukee school districts; the Great Lakes Alliance;
Discovery World; Riveredge Nature Center; and the Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewer-
age District. Teachers are implementing activities, and teams meet in Green Bay dur-
ing the winter to share experiences and plan three, five-day teacher institutes for the
following summer. Phase II, funded by EPA Great Lakes Restoration Initiative, in-
cludes a ten-day leadership institute at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore involving
watershed, conservation, and environmental education organizations and agencies
and schools in Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York. Sev-
eral partnerships are adapting Great Lakes Earth Partnership in coastal watersheds in
Delaware, Maryland, California, Oregon, Washington, and Puerto Rico.
The Chicago Area Earth Partnership, which includes the Chicago Botanic Gar-
den, DuPage County Forest Preserve, and McHenry County Conservation District,
has conducted three EPS institutes with seventy-two teachers from twenty-three
schools, including many from densely populated, urban neighborhoods. A veteran
schoolyard educator had these thoughts after attending an institute:
I have made my living (and passion) designing, building, and teaching about
outdoor classrooms for the last 15 years. . . . EPS is very much the “next gener-
ation.” Back in the “old days” we had to convince parents and school adminis-
trators that these ecological gardens are important and germane to the educa-
tional experience in America today. . . . [The] supporting evidence was not
available ten years ago . . . the psychological and brain-based data that backs up
