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EE Grants Awarded in 2008

This page lists all environmental education grants awarded by EPA in 2008, organized by state. Please see EE Grants 1992-2008 for additional details about EE grants awarded by EPA.

= Grant was awarded by EPA headquarters

Alabama

Alabama Forestry Foundation    $10,700
Chris Erwin, 555 Alabama Street, Montgomery, AL 36104
Teachers Conservation Workshop
This 4-day workshop is designed to give teachers a better understanding of the important role Alabama’s forest ecosystems play in protecting the environment while providing economic resources to the citizens of the state. Guest speakers from government agencies, academic institutions, and industry covers topics such as wildlife, silviculture, fire, tree identification, and water quality. The workshop includes field trips, classroom lecture, and hands-on activities. The audience for this workshop is kindergarten through grade 12 teachers from across Alabama. The teachers come away with a better understanding of the necessity of managing the forests and other natural resources to keep them healthy and productive.

The Martin Foundation    $121,500
Angela Martin, 110 Pawnee Drive, Anniston, AL 36206
Community Unity for a Healthy Life
By educating teachers, students, parents, community leaders, and the public about threats to human health from environmental pollution, Community Unity for a Healthy Life increases the public’s awareness and knowledge about polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), lead, and mercury for residents of the city of Anniston and Calhoun County, Alabama. This project helps to address concerns about these environmental toxins, which have been dumped in the counties over a period of 40 years. Through a community education approach that includes weekly workshops, seminars, and health fairs, members of the community are educated about threats to human health from the toxins and learn how to minimize human exposure to preserve good health. In addition, several resources, including a Web site, a monthly e-newsletter, and an informational brochure, have been developed to further inform community members about various ways that humans may be exposed to contaminants. By increasing the community’s awareness and knowledge, this project enables community members to develop skills to make informed decisions and take responsible actions for their health care. Partners on this project include Family Links, Inc., the Department of Environmental Health Sciences and Biomedical Sciences at the University of Albany, and Jacksonville State University.

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Alaska

Prince William Sound Science Center    $15,000
Lindsay Butters, P.O. Box 705, Cordova, AK 99574
Clean Ocean Robotics
Clean Ocean Robotics guides sixth-grade students to become skilled in the use of robotic technology and its potential application in oil spill response. Students are educated about ocean health and robotics via classroom presentations, workshops, and field trips to local sites, and then provide outreach on the topic during a community-wide festival. Furthermore, five groups of students from grades 4 through 12 participate in marine debris removal during the 2009 National Environmental Education Week. The project enhances stewardship of marine and coastal ecosystems through a series of educational programs; engages a wide range of audiences in ocean-based educational activities using a variety of program delivery techniques; and exposes participants to regional marine research projects and careers in ocean sciences by involving guest scientists in program delivery.

Takshanuk Watershed Council    $11,259
Emily Seward, P.O. Box 1029, Haines, AK 99827
Green Careers for Haines High School Students
Green Careers is a vocation-based internship program for high school students. The program offers a series of internships that integrate existing high school curriculum with rigorous, individualized job training experiences in local fisheries management, tourism, and fish and wildlife law enforcement organizations. The project includes field trips and matches the students with mentors and, the potential for hometown green careers. Students share their knowledge weekly by preparing episodes of “Watershed Weekly” on a local radio station in Haines that airs issues of local environmental concern. This program builds on the Eco-Studies program funded by EPA in 2003.

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Arizona

ABOR, Northern Arizona University    $15,000
James Allen, 1501 S. Knoles Drive, Building 56, Suite 240, Flagstaff, AZ 86011-4130
Junior Forester Academy
In light of the enormity of the issues and the problems surrounding global climate change, solutions must be sought at the local level in each of our communities. Northern Arizona University addresses this reality by modeling it—by offering a week-long overnight summer camp focusing on finding solutions to global climate change and on empowering students within the context of environmental career potential. A collaboration between the College of Education and School of Forestry, the Junior Forester Academy program brings together Arizona youth, ages 13 through 16, in career groups led by experts in the environmental sciences. Among the career fields introduced are environmental engineering, forestry, political science, and conservation. Teaching staff recruited from college campuses throughout the United States undergo rigorous training in the climate-change curriculum and in hands-on learning techniques that engage students. This highly structured program includes in-class learning, projects and activities, guest speakers, a National Science Foundation field trip, and field work. Each career group creates a professional presentation, to be given before a panel of experts and community members. Empowered with new visions of their career opportunities and the initial tools to do something positive for the environment, students represent the community based model for solutions to global climate change.

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Arkansas

Benton County Regional Solid Waste Management District    $12,837
Serina Wilkins, 5702 Brookside Road, Bentonville, AR 72712
Mobile Environmental Learning Center
The Mobile Environmental Learning Center is an interactive trailer where students in grades kindergarten through 6 learn about the importance of recycling and environmental stewardship. Teachers from local Benton County elementary schools are instructed on how to use the center and guide their students through it so they can learn about protecting the environment. Students learn the importance of conservation and recycling. The learning center includes several interactive displays that educate the children on the importance of the environment.

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California

Art From Scrap    $9,249
Cay Sanchez, 302 East Cota Street, Santa Barbara, CA 93101
AFS Green Schools Teacher Training Workshops
Getting “back to the garden” is the method Art from Scrap uses to teach elementary school children in Santa Barbara County to foster appreciation of the natural world. This teacher education program is the first step to promoting positive messages about environmental stewardship in Santa Barbara County schools. It offers the beginnings of a social foundation for encouraging environmental practices that enhance land use for tourism and mitigate the potential for groundwater contamination from commercial use of pesticides and fertilizers in regional agriculture. Art from Scrap sponsors workshops in organic gardening and in composting to classroom teachers, student teachers, classroom aides, parent volunteers, and administrators. Program partner Healing Grounds Nursery provides free plant seedlings and composting worms, the living beginnings for a laboratory where age-appropriate experiments are conducted every day in the most natural way, as children cognitively and physically engage with nature. The fruit of the garden for the community is the opportunity it provides children to internalize positive associations with stewardship of the environment.

California Integrated Waste Management Board    $103,100
Christy Humpert, 1001 I Street, P.O. Box 4025, Sacramento, CA 95812
Strategies for Incorporating the EEI Curriculum into California Classrooms
The California Integrated Waste Management Board (CIWMB) is responsible for implementing the Education and the Environment Initiative (EEI), a program developed under a California law that was enacted in 2003. It requires development and dissemination of a kindergarten through grade 12 environment-based education program for all students in the state’s public schools. The EEI curriculum focuses on the relationship between humans and the environment and addresses various environmental issues, including sustainability, water, air, and pollution prevention. Under this project, CIWMB is developing and implementing a strategy for incorporating the EEI curriculum into California school districts to produce more environmentally literate students. In addition, CIWMB is developing a professional development plan for training educators in use of the EEI curriculum. Teachers attend workshops to learn about EEI and participate in focus group meetings. This project serves as a model for bringing environment-based education into public schools nationwide, institutionalizes environment-based education, and helps to develop more environmentally literate students. Partners in this project include the California Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), the California Department of Education, the State Education and Environmental Roundtable, and the National Geographic Society.

Children's Discovery Museum of San Jose    $39,800
Jenni Martin, 180 Woz Way, San Jose, CA 95110-2780
BioSITE: Students Investigating Their Environment
The Guadalupe River in San Jose is adapting to massive ecological change after the completion of a $100 million urban park and flood control project. BioSITE (BioStudents Investigating their Environment) is dedicated to engaging students in grades 4 through 12 in the ecological restoration of the river, including research and observation of water issues, animal adaptation, fish habitats, life cycles, and bird migration. Its parent organization, the Children’s Discovery Museum of San Jose, promotes “volitional learning through interactive exhibits and programs that engage children in a meaningful inquiry process.” This comprehensive environmental education program, including teacher training in support of learning that is contextualized and concrete, provides high school students with opportunities to gain practical understanding of natural systems, while participating in journaling, cross-age mentoring, public outreach activities, and service projects. Elementary grades 3 through 6 are served by an after-school program and a curriculum that includes water research activities. BioSITE, if not the Guadalupe River, is a persuasive force and model for educational reform: more than 50 percent of its students are considering careers in environmental science or science teaching.

Earth Island Institute    $20,000
Krista Mendelsohn, 1771 Alcatraz Avenue, Berkeley, CA 94703
Watershed Action Program: Safe Bay Food Consumption Project
Concern for the decline of the ecology of the largest estuary on the West Coast of the Americas—the San Francisco Bay Estuary—and its threat to human health from toxic pollution drives the Kids for the Bay teaching program for health awareness and educator skills. Fish and shellfish from the bay are contaminated with toxins, including pesticides at concentrations above thresholds. Studies indicate a significant percentage of bay anglers know nothing about a health advisory, and children particularly are at risk for developmental abnormalities and cancer. Kids for the Bay partners with low-income urban schools that demographically represent the at-risk fishing population. Students and teachers participate, including fourth grade classes, from schools within 5 miles of the bay. Students learn about toxins, watersheds, food chains, and associated risks to human health and transfer that knowledge to the community through demonstrations to their schools and families and to local fishing people. Teachers trained in hands-on environmental activities for the classroom and in the field, including cleanup, learn alongside their pupils and have the opportunity to earn university credit. This program empowers students as the messengers of toxics reduction for their communities, with the advantages of cultural and first-spoken language fluency and Kids-for-the-Bay science literacy.

Friends of the Children's Museum at La Habra    $20,000
Kimberly Powell Albarian, 301 S. Euclid Street, La Habra, CA 90631
Clubhouse H2O
With limited regional water resources, two-thirds of California’s population, and a drought-prone climate, Southern California stands to benefit from The Children’s Museum at La Habra’s plan to make awareness of water conservation a way of life for students and teachers in kindergarten through third grade. A permanent interactive exhibit featuring a downscaled Clubhouse H2O, with kitchen, bathroom, garden, and replica of the municipal water system, is incorporated into the existing mountain watershed display. Reflecting accepted childhood developmental theory, as well as the museum’s ethos, the design of the new exhibit encourages age-appropriate sensory and motor encounter. Envisioned as a destination point for school field trips, the Clubhouse H2O project educates broadly to the community, as the museum receives 95,000 visitors each year. The museum partners with school districts where half the children are impoverished and one-third learn English as a second language. Teachers in the program receive professional training in how to integrate new ways of teaching science into the daily curriculum. The completed project features bilingual standards-based science instruction. Increased benefit to the community is achieved, particularly for low-income households, when conservation-savvy consumers reduce the burden of their water costs.

Friends of the Dunes    $15,000
Margaret Stoudnour, P.O. Box 186, Arcata, CA 95518
Kid's Coastal Education and Collaboration Initiative
The Humboldt Bay beaches and dunes are the largest continuous dune system in northern California, with a variety of wildlife habitats. They provide an ideal outdoor classroom for environmental education along 34 miles of coast. For 25 years, Friends of the Dunes has supported environmental education and stewardship programs on the Samoa Peninsula, with its dune forest, beach, and freshwater wetlands. With the recent purchase by Friends of the Dunes of a 35-acre property on the peninsula, the outdoor classroom gains something akin to university stature among natural teaching settings. The Humboldt Bay Coastal Education Center and Reserve, including a trail system, has been created there as a center for regional coastal education. The current community stewardship project overhauls and adapts all programming to meet the project’s expanded scope. Stronger connections with schools and a weeklong non-residential summer camp for 8 to 12-year-olds are planned. Guides trained for field trips develop games based in concepts such as predator and prey. A daylong fall and spring elementary school field-trip program, an Adopt a Dune service program, and an annual Ocean Day event currently serve students in grades 3 through 6 and their teachers. The “campus” that is the Humboldt Bay coastline and the new center accommodate the need for increasing numbers of kids to have graduated from nature’s school of environmental stewardship.

Placer Nature Center    $6,937
Linda Anne Desai, 3700 Christian Valley Road, Auburn, CA 95602
Science and Stewardship in the Schoolyard
“You need look no further than your own backyard to learn about ecosystems and the interrelationship of all things.” That is the first lesson the fourth and fifth graders attending Placer County public schools learn through the Science and Stewardship in the Schoolyard program. The spirit of the field trip resides in the hands-on exploratory nature of this learning opportunity, where students are outfitted with such scientific tools as microscopes by The Placer Nature Center. Students examine both living and nonliving aspects of the environment in pursuit of knowledge about processes such as photosynthesis and decomposition. They are introduced to larger environmental concepts, such as watersheds, and observe animal life within the context of habitat. Applying science concepts, the students take an active role in restoration and stewardship of the schoolyard ecosystem, evaluating the daily results of their actions. Teachers have the opportunity to gain expertise and access to naturalists and volunteer docents. The immediate goal is to bring more science into the curriculum and improve assessment scores, as surveys reveal that science is being taught minimally or not at all. The journey to the schoolyard culminates in stewardship service, which might be planting trees or native grasses or otherwise enhancing wildlife habitat.

The Regents of the University of California    $29,897
Penelope Walgenbach, Office of Research, Sponsored Programs, 1850 Research Park Drive, Suite 300, Davis, CA 95616
Envirovet Summer Institute 2009
The Regents of the University of California at Davis see the paradigm shift in veterinary medicine under way as an opportunity to respond to the large and looming environmental crises of the day—climate change, habitat degradation, loss of biodiversity, chemical and biological contamination, and specie invasion. The Envirovet Summer Institute is phase 1 in meeting the commitment to training and preparing promising individuals who can assume leadership roles in programs that work toward more sustainable ecosystems for man and animal. It provides veterinary students and professionals with career paths and the initial tools for making long-range investments in environmental research and protection. As it moves closer in focus to its agrarian origins, ensuring food safety, and crop production and transportation, veterinary medicine is fertile ground for developing future environmental leaders. During an 8-week immersion, veterinarians and veterinary students engage in didactic and experiential learning on topics ranging from environmental toxicology to wildlife conservation, and from ecological economics to environmental law and global citizenship. Ultimately, the desired outcome is that veterinarians tend not only to domestic animal companions and to livestock but to all wildlife.

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Colorado

Cottonwood Institute    $19,935
Ford Church, 2930 Birch Street, Denver, CO 80207
Community Adventure Program
The program is a class offered for credit during the school day to public high school students in grades 9 through 12 at New Vista High School and at P.S. 1 Charter School, both alternative schools. Through outdoor education, environmental education, and environmental service-learning, the Community Adventure Program inspires high school students (1) to become active community leaders by completing the award-winning environmental service-learning curriculum; (2) to develop the essential camping and wilderness survival skills of participants; (3) to develop the life skills of participants, including problem solving, project management, logistical coordination, leadership, teamwork, and communication skills. During this class, students go on hikes to practice nature awareness skills, practice essential camping and wilderness survival skills during overnight camping trips, brainstorm local environmental issues, choose an issue to address as a class, and collaborate with other local organizations to design and implement a student-directed action project to address the issue.

Earth Force, Inc.    $90,068
Vince Meldrum, 2120 W. 33rd Avenue, Denver, CO 80211
Preparing Pre-Service Educators to Use Environmental Action Strategies
Earth Force, a national environmental education organization, trains teachers around the country on a unique approach that blends inquiry-based science education with community engagement. Activities are focused on increasing the number of pre-service educators who are trained to integrate environmental action strategies into their classrooms and improving the quality of environmental educators. Earth Force is training staff at each participating university in environmental action strategies, partnering with universities to develop a model that integrates environmental action strategies into their work with pre-service educators, and helping to pilot the integration model with pre-service educators at the universities. The integration model is presented at the 2008 National American Association for Environmental Education (NAAEE) Conference and National Service Learning Conference. Integration of the environmental action plan into pre-service environmental education programs helps position colleges and universities for National Council for the Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE) accreditation. By adopting the environmental action approach in the classroom, teachers facilitate real-world stewardship projects, which enhances student understanding of environmental science projects. It further empowers students to identify and address environmental issues in their communities. Partners in this project include Western Kentucky University, Murray State University, and the University of Wisconsin at Stevens Point.

Eco-Cycle, Inc    $50,000
Cyndra Dietz, P.O. Box 19006, 5030 Pearl Street, Boulder, CO 80308
Green Star Schools Program
Green Star Schools Program represents a change in the way natural resources are managed and consumed. The program is a first-in-the-nation model project that is educating the public about environmental issues in the community, such as waste reduction, recycling, composting, resource conservation, and zero waste. The primary delivery method is waste monitoring, kick-off assemblies, compost, recycling collection, classroom and staff training, lunchroom monitoring, restart assemblies, introduction of reusables, school appreciation and incentives, waste reduction, and zero waste events. The program includes development of promotional materials, incentives, and recognitions for participants.

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Connecticut

New Haven Urban Resources Initiative    $21,199
Colleen Murphy-Dunning, 205 Prospect Street, New Haven, CT 05611
Green Skills = Green Streets
The Green Skills = Green Streets program engages students in community-driven planting project. Students are educated about water cycles, nutrient cycling, wildlife biodiversity, forest structure, the connection between species and habitat diversity, adaptation, and the impact of the urban environment on its natural counterpart. As part of this project, students plant more than 100 street trees throughout the city to help restore New Haven’s street tree canopy. The New Haven Urban Resources Initiative teaches Yale School of Forestry graduate students and high school students about the best practices for street tree planning and the ecosystem services provided by the city’s tree canopy. By engaging them in the planning effect, this project provides high school students with job skills and fosters their sense of environmental stewardship.

The Maritime Aquarium at Norwalk, Inc.    $25,082
Jamie Dickinson, 10 North Water Street, Norwalk, CT 06854
The Water Stewards Project for Norwalk 6th Grade Students
Through living exhibits, marine science and environmental education, the Maritime Aquarium inspires people of all ages to appreciate the Long Island Sound and protect it for future generations. This project teaches all sixth graders from the Norwalk Public School District about nonpoint source pollution affecting Long Island Sound. Students learn how human activity affects water resources in Connecticut and its ecosystems through educational kits, field trips, school and home activities, and science presentations. Teachers learn how to conduct an inquiry-based curriculum focused on nonpoint source pollution. Families are also encouraged to participate and learn about nonpoint source pollution.

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Delaware

Delaware Center for Horticulture, Inc.    $17,580
Joseph Matassino, 1810 North Dupont Street, Wilmington, DE 19806
Youth Environmental Stewardship Program
This project provides technical support for community gardeners throughout the city to beautify Delaware’s roadsides with native vegetation; maintain many of Wilmington’s gateways, corridors, and streetscapes; lead regional conservation stewardship projects to enhance the urban forest in public green spaces; and provide educational programs for children, teens, and adults. The students participate in tree planting, perennial and bulb plantings, a park cleanup, and hands-on learning, and engage in programming with professionals in the environmental field. Urban residents, particularly from low- to moderate-income neighborhoods, are often exposed disproportionately to negative environmental conditions that are more serious than litter. The problem is worsened because there are only a few leaders in the urban neighborhoods who have the background to speak up about environmental concerns. Specifically, this project provides community stewardship by building a consensus regarding neighborhood revitalization efforts and park enhancement. The goal is to encourage continued involvement and volunteerism by youth and cultivate the community’s future environmental leaders. Specifically, this project will provide community stewardship by building a consensus regarding neighborhood revitalization efforts and parks' enhancement activities. The goal is to encourage continued involvement and volunteerism by youth and cultivate the community's future environmental leaders.

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District of Columbia

National Council for Science and the Environment    $24,625
Susan Carlson, 1101 17th Street NW, Suite 250, Washington, DC 20036
EnviroMentors DC Chapter: College and Careers Access Pathway
Students engage in workshops designed to increase their understanding on the many, varied environmental careers available at both the professional and technical levels, the wide variety of environmental college degree programs and the desire among these programs to increase student diversity inclusion. It also emphasizes the array of scholarships, fellowships, and grants available for underrepresented students interested in pursuing environmental science degree programs. Specifically, this project provides the students with career development priorities. The goal of the program is to interest and prepare underrepresented high school students in the Washington, DC, area for college degree programs and careers in science and environmental fields. Among EnvironMentors’ guiding precepts is the belief that full inclusion in the environmental workforce of all cultural and socio-economic groups — particularly those most heavily affected by environmental, health, and justice issues — is needed to achieve environmental sustainability at the local, regional, and national levels.

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Florida

Dream in Green    $41,220
Jane Gilbert, 2000 Ponce de Leon Boulevard, Suite 647, Coral Gables, FL 33134
Green Schools Challenge
The aim of this grant is to make concrete steps toward a more “green” society. This goal is accomplished by integrating hands-on, inquiry-based learning about the local and global environmental impacts of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, sources of and conversion factors for GHG emissions, energy assessments, and conservation methods to teach science, math, and language arts. This project supports the training, resources, coaching, and tracking support necessary for its participating schools to educate students about energy and resource conservation, reduce the carbon footprint of the schools and students’ homes, and provide highly engaging, real-world learning opportunities for students through the use of professional energy analysis tools.

The Conservancy of Southwest Florida    $12,692
Geva Salerno, 1450 Merrihue Drive, Naples, FL 34102
Stormwater Outreach Project
The Conservancy of Southwest Florida creates an outreach program by using volunteers who educate its citizens about the need for stormwater management and water quality protection along the coastline where it affects estuaries and beaches. This program provides lectures to civic groups, clubs, and homeowner organizations in the region. This project teaches individuals about the importance of protecting the land as well as to share practical tools that can be used in their everyday lives. It targets local citizens in the 55 to 75 age range to leverage the number of members and time available.

University of Central Florida    $13,703
Terri Vallery, 12201 Research Parkway, Suite 501, Orlando, FL 32826-3246
Education Recycling
Education Recycling aims to increase recycling rates on the university campus by conducting workshops on environmental stewardship and recycling that targets students living in University of Central Florida (UCF) housing on campus and the building managers for all 123 campus buildings and the entire staff of the UCF library. This project focuses on the community and national issue of recycling and the need to increase recycling rates on a national basis to approach a zero waste stream goal. This project empowers the UCF community to think about its role in stewardship of the environment and the need to increase recycling toward the goal of a zero waste stream campus. Education leads to further knowledge in the community that is be carried back home and to a new generation about the role recycling plays in environmental stewardship.

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Hawaii

Alaka'ina Foundation    $28,856
Todd Lawson, 1600 Kapiolani Boulevard, Suite 530, Oahu, HI 96814
Maui Malama Kahakai Project (Maui Take Care of the Beach)
The Alaka‘ina Foundation provides opportunities in science and technology education to public schools in the County of Maui. The Maui Malama Kahakai (Maui Take Care of the Beach) project employs beach cleanup and ongoing observation of the costal ecosystem by youth as a foundation for long-term stewardship of the ocean environment. It seeks to increase public awareness of an environmental threat to which Hawai‘i is particularly vulnerable—manmade marine debris brought in a “trash gyre” from thousands of miles away. Students in kindergarten through grade 5 and their teachers from the new Pōmaka‘i elementary school confronts the gyre’s destructive potential by adopting the 27-acre shorefront of the Waihe‘e Preserve. During outings, students focus on the direct effects of pollution and study shore animal life and habitats, including endangered species. The project partners with the Maui Coastal Land Trust and the Department of Land and Natural Resources in developing an ocean-literate student body and heightened public sensitivity to manmade marine debris. Although significant concern has been established over the harmful effects of manmade marine debris for other locations, to date little attention has been given to the Waihe‘e Preserve.

The Kohala Center    $24,224
Gregory Smitman, 65 1271A Kawaihae Road, Kamuela, HI 96743
Replicating Kahaluu Reef Teach
Each of the Hawaiian Islands has a premiere beach or reef complex that is a well-trod tourist destination point. Of the 3 million tourists who visit the islands annually, Kahalu‘u Bay receives more than 400,000 visitors. To reduce tourism’s negative impact, The Kohala Center has developed the Saving Kahalu‘u Bay as part of the Reef Teach network. Through instruction on environmental stewardship principals, visitors learn how to experience the reef ecosystem without disturbing turtles, monk seals, and other reef inhabitants. At one time, the bay courted its own destruction as the premier reef encounter with safe, clear, shallow water and abundant tropical reef fishes. Today, trained and dedicated volunteers teach visitors how to distinguish and protect living coral and rock and how to experience the reef without threatening its ecology. Participants in the pilot Reef Teach were found to cause 93 percent less damage to the fragile coral reef when compared with non-participants. The scope of the expanded community education and stewardship network raises awareness of “reef etiquette” and reduce the footprint of a growing audience, including Big Island residents.

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Idaho

Friends of Teton River    $17,125
Amy Verbeten, 36 East Little Avenue, P.O. Box 768, Driggs, ID 83422
Watershed Teacher Institute
The Friends of Teton River holds a 4-day intensive workshop, which includes field and classroom sessions. The program is offered to teachers in kindergarten through grade 12 from rural schools in the Teton Henry’s Fork watershed. The goals of the project are to (1) expand the reach of these programs and improve student performance in science and literacy by developing the teachers’ teaching skills; (2) familiarize teachers throughout the area with the Teton Watershed Curriculum; (3) build teacher knowledge in watershed science concepts; and (4) enhance teaching skills that promote student inquiry, critical thinking, increased achievement in science, and literacy in and stewardship of water resources.

Idaho Department of Fish and Game    $14,978
Amy Parrish, 600 Walnut Street, P.O. Box 25, Boise, ID 83707
Trout in the Classroom Teacher Training
This project provides training for new and existing “Trout in the Classroom” teachers in grades 4 through 12 in a one-credit, 15-hour workshop throughout Idaho. The training covers trout biology, habitat requirements, water quality, and tank care. “Trout in the Classroom” is an existing program in Idaho where teachers and students raise trout in a classroom aquarium and release them into the wild. The program gives students a hands-on opportunity to observe trout development, monitor water quality in the aquarium, and explore a variety of other trout-related educational topics. The Idaho Department of Fish and Game is expanding the program to encourage existing “Trout in the Classroom” teachers to use the program and recruit additional participants.

Palouse Clearwater Environmental Institute    $23,354
Greg Fizzell, P.O. Box 8596, 1040 Rodeo Drive, Moscow, ID 83843
MY WOODS: Moscow Area Youth Working Outdoors Offering Direct Service
This program adds a school-year component to a pilot summer camp offered in a local county park for students in kindergarten through sixth grade. Palouse Clearwater Environmental Institute (PCEI) staff provides schoolyard and field experiences for students and teachers to explore a variety of native ecosystems, empower and instruct teachers in delivery of environmental education, and hosts a 5-week summer program for highly motivated students. Students and their teachers receive multiple exposures to environmental concepts, stewardship behaviors, and to the outdoors itself. The project also develops teachers’ capacity to provide environmental education to students throughout the year through recommended activities, modeling strong environmental education practices, and formal and informal communication before and after field experiences.

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Illinois

Chicago Horticultural Society    $14,000
Patty Benveniste, 1000 Lake Cook Road, Glencoe, IL 60022
Fairchild Challenge Chicago
The Fairchild Challenge Chicago is a series of multi-disciplinary educational challenges that increase student knowledge of local environmental issues and facilitate informed decision making and problem solving skills that enable students to address these concerns. Developing these challenge projects involves students in an array of activities, including civic engagement, service learning, marketing, and a variety of artistic options. The diverse challenge categories provide multiple entry points for varied backgrounds and interest levels, attracting a wide cross-section of youth. Student’s work is recognized at a public awards ceremony and traveling gallery exhibit that highlights their ability to take action on local environmental interests, while bringing regional conservation messages to an array of community stakeholders.

Forest Preserve District of DuPage County    $11,054
David Guritz, 3 South 580 Naperville Road, Wheaton, IL 60187
Earth Partnership for Schools
The Earth Partnership for Schools curriculum is a nationally recognized model for restoration-based educational programming. The program trains teachers in methods for active engagement of their students in an inquiry-based process for restoring native plant landscapes. Teacher teams attend a 5-day summer institute. After the training, partner agencies provide support services, including classroom outreach, field trip instruction, and technical support for development of native plant landscapes on the school grounds for each participating team.

Illinois Department of Public Health    $40,589
Ken Runkle, 525 W. Jefferson Street, Springfield, IL 62761
Online Safe Chemicals in Schools Workshop
The Safe Chemicals in Schools workshop has been a successful environmental education program for teachers to learn about proper chemical storage and handling. In response to increased demand for the workshops, the project takes materials and lessons learned from the workshops and adapts them to an online format. Topics included in the workshop are hazardous chemicals, how to physically store chemicals in the school, microscale and green chemistry, proper purchasing, and how state learning standards can be used to teach science safety more effectively.

Northern Illinois University    $26,689
Dara Little, 301 Lowden Hall, Dekalb, IL 60115
Integration of No Child Left Inside to Promote EE
Teachers are trained on integrating the concept of “No Child Left Inside” within the “No Child Left Behind” framework through the design, development, and delivery of innovative workshops on environmental education. Formal and nonformal teachers identify and gain knowledge about local environmental issues and develop competencies in addressing challenges related to nature deficit disorder. Teachers participate in a training workshop that helps them design a 12-week-long teaching unit and project to integrate into their courses. At the end of the implementation effort, participants are invited to share their outcomes with other educators. A complimentary workshop is offered to nonformal educators.

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Indiana

Ball State University    $36,630
Mary Annette Rose, 2000 W. University Avenue, Muncie, IN 47306
EnviroTech
The mission of the EnviroTech Project is to initiate, enable, and facilitate a critical examination of a contemporary issue that ultimately enhances environmental literacy and technological literacy of technology teachers and their students. A series of Webinars are the primary interactive medium for teachers, the instructor, and guest participants. Between the Webinars, peer-to-peer collaborations and mentoring of teachers are enabled through a discussion board. All resources and tools are accessible from a dedicated Web site. The project provides instruction on (1) understanding environmental processes and systems, (2) skills for identifying, analyzing, and assessing the impacts of technology on the environment, and (3) pedagogical skills in use of guided inquiry. Two questions guide the experience for teachers and students: (1) how might replacing incandescent lamps with compact fluorescent lamps (CFL) affect the environment and society, and (2) what strategies might individuals and communities use to reduce the negative impacts of replacing incandescent lamps with CFLs?

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Iowa

Iowa Public Broadcasting Board    $20,000
Gwen Nagel, 6450 Corporate Drive, Johnston, IA 50131-6450
Using Technology to Provide Environmental Careers Outreach
This project teaches students in grades 4 through 8 and teachers about environmental careers and resources available for students to pursue careers in science. Students and teachers are also taught about environmental issues in their communities. Iowa Public Television, in partnership with youth organizations, universities, and nonprofit organizations, presents interactive video sessions on environmental issues and information about science careers. Students have an opportunity to become aware of science careers and coursework, learn skills to analyze problems, draw conclusions about environmental issues, such as renewable energy, and arrive at an action plan. They also learn how this issue affects their futures and how they can prepare for the challenges ahead in pursuing science careers.

Polk County Conservation Board    $17,642
Patrice Petersen-Keys, 11407 NW Jester Park Drive, Granger, IA 50109
Green Arts Pilot Project
Middle and high school students serve as mentors in a green arts pilot project. This project merges the arts and conservation techniques and encourages environmental stewardship. Local artists, naturalists, and high school student mentors provide green art experiences for sixth grade students. This green arts project connects students with nature, addresses environmental issues, and develops awareness of native ecosystems and their effects on the quality of life. This project also addresses environmental issues, including landscape and habitat restoration, waste reduction, recycling, and water quality.

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Kansas

Blue River Watershed Association    $16,593
Kate Delehunt, 7930 State Line Road, Suite 204, Prairie Village, KS 66208
Project TRUE Blue
As part of this project, teachers participate in a 1-day summit to learn about watersheds and storm water runoff. They learn about the geographic features of the Blue River Watershed, including elevation changes and its major tributaries. Teachers study flooding problems, pollutants, their sources, and the impact on water quality. Teachers also develop a TRUE Blue curriculum and lesson plans for students to study the Blue River Watershed. Finally, students take a field trip to the watershed to monitor water quality.

Friends of the Kaw, Inc.    $19,566
Laura Calwell, P.O. Box 1612, Lawrence, KS 66044
Kids 4 the Kaw
Kids 4 The Kaw project involves students, teachers, and parents in using science to understand river ecology and public health threats from river pollution. This project has added a kid’s corner to the Kaw River Web site and created a Sandbar School. A Sandbar school teaches students ages 9 through 18 about natural history, fish species, how rivers work, and geology and geography. The Sandbar Schools serve students in grade 4 in Douglas County and middle school students from the Potawatomi Boys and Girls Club, their program sponsors, or teachers and families of the students.

Kansas Association for Conservation and Environmental Education    $80,500
Laura Downey-Skochdopole, 2610 Claflin, Manhattan, KS 66502-2743
Capacity Building at the Regional Level
This project, developed by the Kansas Association for Conservation and Environmental Education (KACEE), increases education capacity by enhancing state-level initiatives that legitimize and professionalize delivery of quality, science–based education in the four-state region of Iowa, Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska. KACEE works with EE leaders to assess current capacity-building structures and works collaboratively with a stakeholder team consisting of formal and non-formal environmental educators to create action plans to increase state EE capacity. Program management teams work with stakeholders through workshops, meetings, and a 2-day stakeholder retreat. By drawing on expertise at the regional level, each state develops and implements action plans that advance EE, including EE master plans, EE certification programs, materials and resource review, and an ongoing assessment of environmental literacy at the state level. Through these actions, the project increases state capacity to deliver quality EE and therefore the environmental literacy of the region’s citizens. Partners on this project include the Iowa Conservation and Education Council (ICEC), the Missouri Environmental Education Association (MEEA), and the Nebraska Alliance for Conservation and Environmental Education (NACEE).

University of Kansas Center for Research    $19,999
Peter Macfarlane, 2385 Irving Road, Lawrence, KS 66044-7552
Environmental Stewardship of an Urban Stream in Kansas City, Kansas
Environmental Stewardship of an Urban Stream helps middle school students learn about environmental stewardship of an urban stream in Kansas City, Kansas. Students monitor a local stream and evaluate stream health. This project provides middle school students an opportunity to explore and become environmental stewards of the watershed and to learn about stream monitoring methodology. Students also learn about environmental science, engage in watershed cleanup, discuss stewardship issues, and prepare presentations about their work. This project is in partnership with the University of Kansas, The Central Plains Center for BioAssessment, and the Kansas Geological Survey. At the end of the project, students lead a symposium for community members to share the results of the study. Members of the public have an opportunity to learn how they can become involved in improving the quality of streams in the community.

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Kentucky

Environmental and Public Protection Cabinet    $18,000
Aaron Keatley, 300 Fair Oaks Lane, Frankfort, KY 40601
Kentucky Sustainability Institute
The Kentucky Sustainability Institute is a 1 -day workshop to address sustainability, including green buildings, smart growth, and Brownfields redevelopment. These issues have impacts on all areas of the environment, including habitat preservation, stormwater management, and energy conservation. Public health, economic development, and infrastructure issues can also be addressed via sustainable redevelopment methods that increase public awareness of environmental issues such as traffic congestion, health problems, sprawl, sewer overflow, and many others. This workshop brings forth ideas on how to best prepare for these issues that can be a hazard to the public’s health. The workshop is delivered at four Kentucky Community and Technical College System campuses across the state to ensure that interested parties have an opportunity to attend the workshop in an area close to their community. The initial target audience is municipal and county government officials and staff, community leaders, and citizens.

Jefferson County Public Schools    $10,000
Rosalind Scott, P.O. Box 34020, Louisville, KY 40232-4020
Farmer's Fragile Floyds Fork Watershed Connection
The intent of this project is fourfold: (1) to construct an outdoor classroom to provide assistance to teachers in planning lessons to connect school campus to the classroom curriculum; (2) increase linkages between disciplines that are standards-based and focus on student work; (3) design a high-performing learning environment that encourages out-of-the classroom work and allows students to achieve at high levels; and (4) to provide a focal point for staff development that supports and enhances the work of daily instruction. All Farmer teachers participate in the professional development sessions, collaborate with the science teachers to address the critical issues in an interdisciplinary approach to learning, and help to build and use the outdoor classroom in some capacity.

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Louisiana

Teaching Responsible Earth Education (T.R.E.E.)    $46,984
Sue Brown, 1504 Magazine Street, New Orleans, LA 70130
Sunship III
Sunship III is a 3-day and 2-night program for seventh grade students. Sunship III offers real-world exploratory learning experiences at a 22-acre wooded outdoor classroom site and hands-on introductory and continuation activities in the classroom throughout the school year. The outdoor classroom teaches the core life sciences concepts of energy flow, life cycles, interrelationships, and change. These concepts are presented by engaging students in 12 interactive problem-solving activities over 3 school days at the outdoor classroom. In the classroom and at home, students complete a series of stewardship activities to educate their families and other students and apply their newly learned knowledge to their own lives. This program builds on grade 4 Earthkeepers and the grade 5 Sunship Earth experience that is offered in New Orleans. The goal of the T.R.E.E. organization is “to educate children and adults about the life science processes that govern our planet, to inspire them to appreciate the natural world and to motivate them to protect it”.

Teaching Responsible Earth Education (T.R.E.E.)    $114,483
Sue Brown, 1504 Magazine Street, New Orleans, LA 70130
Earthkeepers
Earthkeepers is part of a series of innovative programs developed for New Orleans-area school children by Teaching Responsible Earth Education (T.R.E.E.) to improve student academic outcomes and prepare students to serve as future social, civic, and environmental leaders. Earthkeepers offers both real-world exploratory learning experiences in the outdoors and hands-on activities in the classroom to teach the core life science concepts of energy flow, cycles, interrelationship, and change. Students in grade 4 are engaged in 12 interactive, problem-solving activities over 3 school days at the Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve. In addition, students complete a series of stewardship activities at home and in the classroom to educate their families and other students and to apply their knowledge to their own lives. The program teaches students that they have the ability to alter the quality of the environment and their own lives. This knowledge is imparted by immersing students in the natural world to convey essential life science concepts and engaging students in hands-on activities that reveal interdependence of humans and nature. The integration of this program into the fourth-grade curriculum advances state and local education reform goals, increases environmental stewardship and literacy, and improves sustainability for environmental education programs. Partners on this project include New Orleans charter schools, the Jean Lafitte National Historic Park and Preserve, and the College of Education at the University of Arizona.

University of New Orleans    $17,514
Diane Frances Maygarden, 2000 Lakeshore Drive, New Orleans, LA 70148
Coastal Wetlands Stewardship Project in Greater New Orleans Schools
This project involves teachers and students in a hands-on wetlands restoration project. Teachers attend a 3-day workshop, including a field trip to learn about the science of the coastal marshes and biology of the plants they grow with the students. University staff work with school teachers and students to prepare them for growing the wetlands plants in the schools. Secure growing areas are set up at each participating school. University staff provide plants and planting supplies, monitor progress, and provide classroom support as the students nurture the plants and study their growth. Science projects are developed at each stage of the simple growing and monitoring activities. At the end of the school year, students participate in planting these plants at a wetland restoration site.

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Maine

Friends of the Cobbossee Watershed    $12,330
Tamara Whitmore, P.O. Box 5003, Augusta, ME 04332
Friends of the Cobbossee Watershed's "Watershed Education in the Classroom Project"
The Watershed Education in the Classroom Project teaches students in grades 4, 5, and 6 in the Cobbossee Watershed about nonpoint source pollution and invasive aquatic plants that affect the ecological and economic stability of the watershed. The project's goal is to increase knowledge of water quality issues and concepts in the watershed for current and future stewards.

Good Will Home Association    $9,804
Deborah Staber, Route 201, P.O. Box 159, Hinkley, ME 04944-0159
After School Programs: Inspiring an Interest in Maine's Natural Environment
In after-school programs for children (kindergarten through grade 5) and their families, this project teaches about Maine’s natural habitats, wildlife diversity, and environmental stewardship. Students learn about environmental issues created by road salt, rubbish, invasive plants and animals, and potential solutions and outcomes. There are 16 12-week sessions and eight Saturday family exploration sessions.

Gulf of Maine Institute    $106,433
John Terry, 487 Clarks Mills Road, Dayton, ME 04005
Gulf of Maine Institute Teacher Training Initiative
The Gulf of Maine Institute’s (GOMI) mission is to inspire young people, in partnership with adults, to lead stewardship efforts in the Gulf of Maine and its watershed. As part of the Teacher Training Initiative, GOMI is developing a model teacher training program that prepares social science and environmental educators to incorporate hands-on, experiential initiatives into the curriculum. Participating teachers attend 2-week-long summer workshops that serve as core training in environmental science, team building, and civic engagement. In addition, participants develop a teacher’s kit designed to effectively introduce teachers to “place-based” experiential education. Participating teachers develop community-based initiative teams at their schools and form a cadre of trainers to disseminate these tools and resources at their schools. Dissemination of this model is further aided with presentations at several regional annual teacher conferences, as well as with workshops and Web site development. The initiative enables students to become more competent in science and environmental stewardship by helping to foster teams of educators who change the ways science and social science are taught and learned. The primary partner on this project is Tufts University.

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Maryland

Garrett County Board of Education    $64,888
Barbara Baker, 40 South 2nd Street, Oakland, MD 21550
Explorers - Environmental Education and Stewardship Development Program
The pilot Explorers-Environmental Education and Stewardship Development Program is implemented by Garrett County Schools to excite students about environmental education and provide teachers with the necessary skills to integrate environmental education into the regular classroom instruction. The program consists of an after-school science club that focuses on the local watershed and uses it as an organizing principle to integrate disciplines while providing a meaningful context of learning. The program involves various school sites that teach about schoolyard ecosystems as well as the people and communities of the watershed. During the program, fourth-grade students meet on a regular basis after school and for a 4-day summer workshop. In addition, there are three field trips, including a trip to the Canaan Valley Institute research watershed. Teachers receive additional professional development workshops for content and curriculum design. Through this program, students address topics on the sustainability of natural resources, including watershed concepts, human impacts, sustainable communities, and civic action. The goal is to produce high-performing, environmentally literate students and to create schools that model best environmental practices. Partners on this project include the Maryland State Department of Education’s Environmental Education Program (MEEP), Maryland Department of Natural Resources, the University of Maryland’s Center for Environmental Science Appalachian Laboratory, the Youghiogheny River Watershed Association, and the Hickory Environmental Education Center.

National Aquarium in Baltimore    $21,934
Carl Hackerman, 501 East Pratt Street, Baltimore, MD 21202
Community-Based Restoration of Atlantic White Cedar Habitat
Through live exhibitory, education programs, and community-based habitat restoration, the Baltimore Aquarium seeks to instill in both adults and children an appreciation for and an awareness of the Earth’s marine ecosystems. The National Aquarium in Baltimore proposes to build partnerships with local schools in Worcester County, Maryland, to provide a unique, hands-on experience for students to restore critical Atlantic white cedar (AWC) habitat in Bishopville, Maryland. This project restores and enhances the ecosystem in the upper St. Martins River, currently regarded as the most degraded river in the Coastal Bays. The proposed project creates a compelling pathway for scientific investigation and stewardship over the year. The project provides teachers and students with hands-on education experiences in the Coastal Bays using the Schoolyard Spartina model. It supplies practical investigative experience using horticultural experiments to grow AWC for the community-based project. A workshop introduces teachers to the project and the role students and teachers play. In addition, 900 AWC are monitored, maintained, and then planted at the Bishopville restoration site. Finally, an environmental education program that meets the Maryland and National Science Content Standards is implemented, along with three safe and effective restoration field events.

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Massachusetts

Gloucester Maritime Heritage Center    $22,574
Harriet Webster, 23 Harbor Loop, Gloucester, MA 01930
Ocean Explorers: 3rd and 4th Grade Marine Science Program
The Ocean Explorers: 3rd and 4th Grade Marine Science Program educates students on local marine resources. Through first hand exposure to the local marine source, Gloucester Public Schools elementary students develop a respect for the natural environment and a sense of their own impact on the environment. In this project, third- and fourth-grade GPS classrooms make two full day visits to the Gloucester Maritime Heritage Center where students rotate through a series of hands-on activities in the lab and aboard a small research vessel. A GMHC educator visits each classroom four times during the school year to conduct hands-on lessons relating to marine science topics. Students explore plankton collection and identification, water quality, marine habitats, and human effects on this environment. Through these activities, this program equips children with skills and information needed to pass state mandated science tests and develop a model program for dissemination to other New England coastal communities.

Organization for the Assabet River    $12,502
Amanda Lee Davis, 9 Damonnmill Square, Suite 1E, Concord, MA 01742
Community-Based Water Wise Workshops
Working in partnership with Massachusetts Audubon Society’s Drumlin Farm Education Department, this organization offers a series of 1-hour, outdoor, summer workshops for children ages 6 through 12 on watershed and the water cycle, aquatic plants, aquatic animals, water bugs, water testing, water conservation, and water pollution. A total of 56 workshops are being offered over the 7 weeks of the summer program.

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Michigan

Dickinson Conservation District    $23,508
Ann Hruska, 102 N. Hooper Street, Kingsford, MI 49802
Energized for the Future
Energized for the Future takes curriculum lessons on energy, fossil fuels, and sustainable resources, its uses, and its impact on the environment and makes them come alive for students. Students in eighth grade learn how to audit their own energy use in school and at home. Teachers are reached through a kickoff workshop and direct classroom contact. Students benefit from the classroom interactive programs and the inquiry-based energy saving tools supplied to use at home with their family. Community members participate by viewing energy conservation messages through cable television, interviews on local television, newspaper articles, and a Web site. The purpose of this project is to help students and teachers connect energy resource issues to their everyday lives, both as individuals and collectively as part of a school or home, and that they can be a part of the solution by employing real word energy quantification and conservation methods to make wise energy decisions. With the knowledge gained both in the classroom and from community field trips, they make real world recommendations and help encourage decisions in the classroom, school and home that promote sustainable use of earth's resources relating to energy.

Inland Seas Education Association    $29,770
Tom Kelly, 101 Dame Street, P.O. Box 218, Suttons Bay, MI 49682
Invasive Species Education Initiative
The Invasive Species Education Initiative contains the following components: Invasive Species Field Course for Teachers, Advanced Invasive Species Field Course for Teachers, High School Invasive Species Field Course, and enhanced invasive species exhibits at the education center. The objective of the initiative is to increase awareness and knowledge of invasive species and provide educational materials to integrate invasive species research into classroom and local communities and form networks to increase access to resources on invasive species.

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Minnesota

Higher Education Consortium for Urban Affairs    $15,000
Julia Nerbonne, 2233 University Avenue W, Suite 210, St. Paul, MN 55114
Environment and Agriculture
The Higher Education Consortium for Higher Affairs offers a 2-week immersion course for undergraduate students in environment and agriculture. The program offered in the spring focuses on connections among agriculture, sustainability, and global environmental justice. During the first week, students explore environmental themes as a group through reading, discussions, and group field trips to select farms. During the second week, students participate in a 3-day farm stay, where they use a set of guided questions to better understand the day-to-day challenges of running a sustainable farm. After the farm stay, students explore how farming relates to urban sustainability in Minnesota and abroad.

Proctor Public Schools ISD 704    $44,446
Diane Podgornik, 131 9th Ave, Proctor, MN 55810
Lake Superior Youth Symposium
A Lake Superior Youth symposium for middle and high school students throughout the Lake Superior watershed is hosted by Proctor Public Schools. The goal of the symposium is to enhance the ability and motivation of middle and high school students and teachers to understand and act on the environmental issues that face Lake Superior, both now and in the future. To accomplish the goal, students explore hands-on investigations, field trips, challenge courses, workshops, and exhibits. Through educator workshops, teacher and parent chaperones obtain new knowledge and problem-solving skills that can be integrated into their work with young people. Model student groups are invited to make presentations on projects they have implemented in the local communities around Lake Superior to inspire participants to do the same after the symposium.

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Missouri

Friends of the Green Center    $24,280
Susan Mintz, 8025 Blackberry Avenue, St. Louis, MO 63130
Calvary Prairie Education and Restoration Project
The Calvary Prairie Education and Restoration Project involves three components. First, the Ecological Restoration Corps (ERC) provides hands-on workshops and restoration projects for high school students in grades 10 through 12. ERC also provides training in conservation to encourage career exploration in the sciences. This portion of the project involves restoration of the Calvary Prairie through burning, plant reintroduction, and exotic species control. Outreach and education efforts have been expanded to build community support for the project. The second component is a field experience program for students in grades 3 through 5 at elementary schools. Students participate in seasonal field trips to Calvary Prairie in both fall and spring. Activities include carver plot studies, wildlife surveys, nature journaling, food web investigations, and propagating and planting native plants. The third component is an enviroarts project. In this component, residents from local churches, a public library, four local schools, neighborhood associations, and a community arts training program develop a formal collaborative to work on a project at the prairie.

Missouri Botanical Garden    $24,507
Glenda Abney, 3617 Grandel Boulevard, St. Louis, MO 63108
Investigate Green School
Students and teachers assume the roles of energy auditors, building designers, and green building ambassadors to present the benefits of green buildings to the public. They present information about the advantages of going green and create public service announcements to get the message out to the public and at school board meetings. Students and teachers learn about green schools, steps school districts can take to “green” their buildings, and how schools can lead community-wide sustainability efforts. They also learn about energy consumption, the impact of schools on the environment, and options for reducing energy in schools.

Parents as Teachers National Center, Inc.    $9,738
Kate McGilly, 2228 Ball Drive, St. Louis, MO 63146
Prevention Through Parent Education in Arkansas
Parents as Teachers conducts a workshop titled, “Neurotoxins: Their Effects on Development, Learning and Behavior.” This project involves training early childhood professionals on how to teach women of child-bearing age and families about child development through parent education. Parents as Teachers holds a train-the-trainer workshop and delivers information to women about the effects on child development of household chemicals, hazardous materials, and exposure to chemical mixtures. This workshop teaches women about precautions they can take when they handle hazardous chemicals and how to prevent a broad array of birth defects and disabilities. These activities serve families with support and enhance child development through parent education.

Parents as Teachers National Center, Inc.    $22,403
Kate McGilly, 2228 Ball Drive, St. Louis, MO 63146
Prevention Through Parent Education in Texas
Parents as Teachers conducts a workshop titled, “Neurotoxins: Their Effects on Development, Learning and Behavior.” This project involves training early childhood professionals on how to teach women of child-bearing age and families about child development through parent education. Parents as Teachers holds a train-the-trainer workshop and delivers information to women about the effects on child development of household chemicals, hazardous materials, and exposure to chemical mixtures. This workshop teaches women about precautions they can take when they handle hazardous chemicals and how to prevent a broad array of birth defects and disabilities. These activities serve families with support and enhance child development through parent education.

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Montana

Montana Tech of the University of Montana    $23,780
Matt Vincent, 1300 W Park Street, Butte, MT 59701
Clark Fork Watershed Education Program Director
This project provides teachers with the skills and knowledge to integrate place-based environmental education content into standard curricula and promotes inclusion of place-based environmental education content in standard district curricula. To build stewardship, communities must understand the science motivating the Upper Clark Fork Basin transformation and what average citizens can do to maintain the health of the newly restored watershed. The CFWEP, with its partners, manages and conducts the project. The audience served by this project consists of teachers working in grades 5 through 9 with an emphasis on science and math teachers. The strategy of this project is to design, promote, and deliver professional development workshops that provide teachers with existing environmental education curricula and supporting materials. Teachers gain background content knowledge on the environmental history of the watershed and the science behind ongoing reclamation and restoration. They are trained in use of environmental education content to meet state and national education standards. Environmental literacy improves in Upper Clark Fork Basin communities, resulting in increased environmental stewardship and the continued restoration and perpetual health of area ecosystems.

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Nebraska

Groundwater Foundation    $19,000
Cindy Kreifels, 5561 South 48th Street, Lincoln, NE 68516
Waterways Education for Urban and Rural Youth
Waterways for Urban and Rural Youth is a creative outdoors water project to encourage creative play and inquiry-based learning methods. This project builds awareness and establishes a connection to nature and to groundwater. This project teaches information on groundwater to students in kindergarten through grade 12. Students have an opportunity to attend field trips to learn about groundwater, nature, and the environment. Project partners also encourage creative water activities to be incorporated and delivered to existing youth programs throughout Nebraska.

Nebraska Game and Parks Commission    $20,000
Jeanine Lackey, P.O. Box 30370, Lincoln, NE 68503
Nebraska's Bird Diversity - An Educational Toolbox
Teachers create a tool box composed of curriculum on CDs that contain videos, slide shows, and interviews, a teacher’s manual on each topic, resources, classroom activities, and lesson plans. This tool box covers topics such as avian adaptations, bird species at risk, habitat needs, and ecoregion-specific information. Students, teachers, and landowners receive information on Nebraska’s birds, habitats, and the environment. Copies of the tool box are distributed to teachers in grades 5 through 8 during workshops at schools, nature centers, and conservation organizations held across the state. Two of the workshops focus on training resource professionals, the public, and landowners; the other two focus on teachers. These materials have the potential to reach students, landowners, and resource professionals throughout Nebraska.

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Nevada

Sierra Nevada Journeys    $9,850
Jonathan Mueller, 1901 Silverada Boulevard, Suite 10, Reno, NV 89512
Journeys Outdoor School
Forty-five percent of Nevada fourth graders tested below proficiency in science in 2005. Increasingly disconnected from opportunities to study science, students in Western Nevada have the opportunities to experience the natural world. Sierra Nevada Journeys is offering school outreach and extra-school programs to foster a community of youth who are leaders, scientists, and stewards of the natural world. To meet the need of students to engage with their local ecosystems and natural communities, Journeys Outdoor School conducts a 4-day residential education program at Grizzly Creek Ranch, on the eastern slope of the Sierra Nevada Mountains. This program involves extensive experiential learning, appealing to multiple intelligences, including daylong hikes, wildlife counts, and astronomy sessions. Lessons in natural resource conservation include water use and its impacts. Service projects teach forest management techniques—key to stewardship of the drought-prone slopes of the eastern Sierra Nevada—with the ranch’s herd of goats as ambassadors of fuel suppression. The program serves students in Washoe County and Carson City, generally in grades 5 through 7, and teachers. Anticipated outcomes include students who are enthusiastic self-motivated learners, maturation in interpersonal and conflict resolution skills, and increased science scores.

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New Hampshire

Clean Air - Cool Planet, Inc.    $41,714
Amanda Muise, 100 Market Street, Suite 204, Portsmouth, NH 03801
Fostering Environmental Stewardship and Action in Southern New Hampshire
New Hampshire towns are creating Local Energy Committees (LECs) – community groups charged with assessing and improving their town’s actions on energy use and conservation. Clean Air-Cool Planet (CA-CP) works with existing LECs and fosters creation of new LECs with the goal of increasing environmental stewardship and encouraging towns to make sustainable decisions on energy, transportation, waste disposal, and land use. This project facilitates a series of community meetups featuring insight from local leaders to educate town residents about local environmental issues and solutions to climate change. In addition, CA-CP organizes face-to-face workshops for LEC members, writes and distributes case studies, and updates the LEC handbooks.

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New Jersey

Burlington County College    $24,000
Cathlene Leary-Elderkin, 601 Pemberton Browns Mills Road, Pemberton, NJ 08068
New Jersey Pinelands, Pollution and You
This project, “New Jersey Pinelands, Pollution and You” takes students into the New Jersey Pinelands to learn the ecological principles, human impacts on, and the role environmental stewardship play in the Pinelands, a large watershed for 19 rivers within the Pinelands Natural Reserve. Pre- and post-trip classroom activities enhance the lessons learned on the field trips. This project provides environmental education programs for sixth through eighth grade students in schools designated as “in need” in Camden, Burlington, and Ocean Counties. A poster contest encourages students to incorporate the lessons learned about environmental stewardship into a visual message. Copies of the winning poster are distributed to schools throughout the regional watershed to further encourage development of stewardship for this important natural resource. Pine Barrens Ecology, a curriculum resource, is revised as part of the funded project.

Great Swamp Watershed Association    $8,966
Hazel England, P. O. Box 300, New Vernon, NJ 07976
One River, One Community Project
The Great Swamp Watershed Association is partnering with two fourth-grade classes — one from the upper and one from the lower Passaic River — and two high school classes, from Great Swamp Watershed and Newark, to take part in learning and discovery on the biological and environmental issues that affect the Passaic River. Students take part in classroom, online, and field educational programming. Teachers and students learn about water quality issues that affect the Passaic and explore similarities and differences between the upper and lower river ecosystems. Innovative methods in this program include peer-to-peer teaching: the high school students teach the fourth graders. Students prepare posters and, at a culminating event, share with the community various steps citizens can take to be stewards of the river and its drainage area.

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New Mexico

Asombro Institute for Science Education    $20,000
Stephanie Bestelmeyer, P.O. Box 891, Las Cruces, NM 88004
Real-World, Real-Science Project
The Asombro Desert Nature Park is a non-profit organization established in 1990 to improve scientific literacy and environmental understanding of the Chihuahuan Desert Ecosystem. The organization created a “Real World - Real Science Project” that expands the field trip learning experience for middle school students. The Real World - Real Science Project hosts a workshop for middle school teachers from Dona Ana County, New Mexico, and El Paso County, Texas, to train them to use a full, enhanced program that relates the field trip experience with the rest of the curriculum. They host pre-field trip activities to help introduce students to vocabulary and concepts. The teachers also hold activities after the field trip that help students extend the information they learned to other areas of their lives.

Gila Conservation Education Center    $25,648
Bob Wilson, 3005 E. Camino del Bosque, Silver City, NM 88061
San Vicente Creek-side Classroom
The San Vicente Creek riparian area is threatened by illegal dumping and neglect. The project, San Vicente Creek-side Classroom, educates students in grades kindergarten through 12 by conducting outdoor learning expeditions through an outdoor classroom for learning sponsored by the Gila Conservation Education Center. Kiosks, educational signs, and a bench theater seating area are available for visitors to the center. Local high school students and area experts conduct guided tours for elementary age students, and local citizens and visitors conduct self-guided tours with information provided by the kiosks. The ultimate goal is to provide education on preserving the San Vicente Creek riparian area.

Hawks Aloft, Inc.    $15,902
Gail Garber, P.O. Box 10028, Albuquerque, NM 87184
Living with the Landscape
This project teaches students in grades 1 through 5 about the importance of environmental stewardship and encourages critical thinking and problem-solving through a hands-on, project-based curriculum. This project uses live non-releasable birds of prey (raptors) to illustrate important ecological concepts. First graders in the program receive a classroom visit with live raptors. Second and third graders receive a classroom visit with live raptors and a conservation education program delivered by their fourth and fifth grade peers. The fourth-grade program consists of three classroom visits and two field trips per classroom. The classroom visits include discussion sessions, presentation of two raptors, and other educational activities. Field trips focus on putting theory presented in the classroom into practice. Fifth graders select a school-wide conservation theme to study for the year and implement a conservation project in the local community.

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New York

Alfred University    $12,000
Michele Hluchy, 1 Saxon Drive, Alfred, NY 14802
Environmental Science Training Workshop
This Alfred University project enables undergraduate education students (pre-service teachers) and current (in-service) teachers to provide the materials and skills to teach students about the role humans play in degrading and protecting the environment. Educators (both pre- and in-service) take part in workshops to learn how to use the Global Learning and Observations to Benefit the Environment (GLOBE) program, a well-respected, scientifically oriented and environmentally focused program. Teachers and their students participate in a field day at Alfred University using the GLOBE protocols for studying soil, water, and land use with assistance from the workshop leaders. This program fosters environmental stewardship as both the current and future teachers who participate in this program implement ongoing environmental classroom and field activities.

CEC Stuyvesant Cove, Inc    $10,000
Christopher Collins, 24-20 FDR Drive Service Road East, New York, NY 10010
The Green Design Lab
The Green Design Lab teaches high school students to assess energy, water, waste, and food flows in the Manhattan Comprehensive high school building. They create a detailed proposal for how to “green” the school, including a plan for capital renovations. This project uses existing curricula and resources to pioneer a new environmental educational strategy that incorporates science, art, design, community stewardship, and career development, with an emphasis on creativity, applied problem solving, and career training.

City Parks Foundation    $34,200
Jessica Lerman, 830 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY 10021
Seed to Trees
City Parks Foundation works to improve New York City’s neighborhood parks by providing free, high-quality parks programs, particularly in underserved areas, that appeal to the diverse interests of New York City residents. This funded project, “Seeds to Trees,” includes classroom lessons and parkland field experiences for students and workshops and ongoing assistance throughout the school year for teachers at participating schools. Program units include forest ecology, urban wildlife and human impact, geology, decomposition and waste reduction, and water conservation. Students and educators develop the awareness, knowledge, skills, and understanding to become stewards of their local environments and urban parks.

Friends of Van Cortlandt Park    $15,000
Christina Taylor, 124 Gale Place, Apt. GRA, Bronx, NY 10463
Summer Environmental Internship Program
The Friends of Van Cortlandt Park runs the Summer Environmental Internship Program for New York City high school students. The program provides hands-on summer employment within Van Cortlandt and other parks in the city. The summer environmental interns obtain first-hand experience maintaining and learning about the ecosystems in urban parks, in the process developing an understanding of the need to protect the natural environment and the ways visitors to a natural area affect its ecosystems. Students work with staff and volunteers from environmental and natural resource providers, agencies, and organizations to acquire increased knowledge of career opportunities in the environment as well as basic job skills. By working in this urban ecosystem, participants acquire environmental knowledge and skills and undertake tasks reflecting their commitment to environmental stewardship.

National Audubon Society, Inc.    $120,000
Judy Braus, 700 Broadway, New York, NY 10003
Climate Change "Train the Trainers" Workshop and Pilot
Under this project, the National Audubon Society helps community and educational leaders across the country acquire the knowledge, skills, and resources to educate people about climate change issues and assists in developing the skills to make decisions about reducing their carbon footprints. Audubon uses a “train–the-trainers” online conferencing workshop for individuals selected from various Audubon centers and their partner community-based organizations to enhance their knowledge about climate change and develop scientifically accurate and educationally sound programming to engage the target audiences. In the workshop, the leaders learn how to design new programs as well as components about climate change that can be embedded into courses that their organizations already offer. Workshop participants are provided with materials that can be used for local outreach and programming. After the workshop, Audubon pilots the development, implementation, and evaluation of climate change programming, with the objective of reaching new audiences and capturing best practices for dissemination among Audubon’s entire network of centers and partners. Results of this project include education leaders who are better trained and equipped to educate people across the country about what they can do to affect climate change, citizens who are more aware of how their actions affect climate change, and a model for climate change that can easily be replicated in other regions. The key partner in this project is the National Wildlife Federation, along with a variety of community-based organizations.

The Point Community Development Association    $15,000
Maria Torres, 940 Garrison Avenue, Bronx, NY 10474
The Jackie and the Beanstalk Project
This program serves children in the Hunts Point section of the Bronx in New York City. It fills a need to educate fourth, fifth, and sixth graders about the environmental health issues in the South Bronx that directly affect them, especially asthma. Centered on an interactive live performance of “Jackie and the Beanstalk,” the program includes a pre-performance classroom component and a follow-up civics lesson as student learn about the factors that affect air quality. Students learn about the ways to minimize the risk of asthma (its incidence is elevated in this community) and preserve good health for themselves and their community. They discover how they can interact with members of the public, community, and government who, along with them, can take action to improve air quality. This immediate and meaningful topic promotes environmental stewardship as students take steps to improve local air quality.

Wildlive Conservation Society    $19,949
Lee Livney, 2300 Southern Boulevard, Bronx, NY 10460
Voyage from the Sun
Voyage from the Sun is an online training course for middle school teachers in New York and across the U.S. The course focuses on the links among energy, ecology, and conservation as well as climate change. The online course is directed toward teachers across the U.S., with and emphasis on those without ready access to advance state or local education reform goals. The project promotes environmental stewardship by equipping educators with the means to teach students how use and extraction of energy-related resources affect ecosystems and effective approaches to ameliorating those impacts.

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North Carolina

Elon University    $15,000
Bonnie Bruno, 100 Campus Drive, 2610 Campus Box, Elon, NC 27215
Haw Rivers Land Stewards
This project fosters a conservation ethic among Haw River landowners through recruitment for and participation in the Haw River Land Stewards (HRLS) program. HRLS provides educational opportunities and resources through direct contact with the landowners. It also reduces pollution loading to Haw River from riparian areas through land purchases for conservation and promotes public awareness of the need to protect regional water quality related to the Haw River by prominently visible signage designating “Haw River Land Steward.” The conservation outcomes of this project are a community and social network of riverfront landowners interested in the welfare of the river, recruitment and identification of a group of landowners who are interested in becoming HRLS, and the ability to make additional presentations on conservation opportunities and benefits to landowners. A final intent is to foster the willingness of some of the landowners to enter their land into permanent conservation programs either through sale or donation of land to an appropriate agency.

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Ohio

Ohio River Foundation    $19,592
Erin Lang Crowley, P.O. Box 42460, Cincinnati, OH 45242
School Rain Garden
In greater Cincinnati, there is a significant lack of education and information about the Ohio River and its watershed, even though it is a source of drinking water to millions of people. The first function of this project is to provide hands-on learning about watersheds and stormwater management. The school rain garden is an education-outreach and stewardship program geared for students in grades 6 through 12. The second function is to enable students to design and implement rain gardens that serve as a model for the community at large. Designing and building rain gardens further develops skills in math and science.

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Oregon

Environmental Education Association of Oregon    $40,813
Linda Rhoads, 133 SW 2nd Avenue, Suite 307, Portland, OR 97204
Watershed-focused Leadership Development
This project brings together formal and non-formal educators and community representatives from across Oregon to create educational solutions for watershed stewardship, ecosystem protection, and sustainability. The Environmental Education Association of Oregon (EEAO) leads, manages, and facilitates an 11-month planning process culminating in a 3-day leadership clinic for participants to design and create action plans for watershed-focused educational and community engagement projects. At the conclusion of the clinic, the teams, which are composed of educators, watershed council representatives, and other community leaders, have developed action plans for projects to implement in their home watersheds. EEAO uses a national workshop model developed by the National Environmental Education Advancement Project funded by EPA for the leadership clinic and offers continuing education credits for the teachers.

Lane Community College    $14,673
Jennifer Hayward, 4000 East 30th Avenue, Eugene, OR 97405
Lane Community College's Sustainability Infusion Project
Lane Community College’s Sustainability Infusion Project (SIP) equips college faculty members with the skills and tools necessary to infuse concepts of sustainability into existing teaching curricula. The college is hosting two “train-the-trainer” workshops to train faculty members. The trained faculty members in turn train additional faculty members, each providing the teachers a strategy for infusing sustainability into all aspects of student learning across campus departments. SIP replicates the American Association for Sustainability in Higher Education’s Sustainability across the Curriculum Leadership workshops.

Resource Innovation Group    $24,281
Robert Doppelt, P.O. Box 51182, Eugene, OR 97405
Climate Brigade Program
This project (1) completes a model for outreach to households around climate change and reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions;(2) runs two pilots on outreach to businesses in Eugene on the same topic; and (3) plans to disseminate the model regionally and nationally. The program trains Climate Masters during a 10-week train-the-trainer program modeled after the Master Recycler program and mobilizes a brigade of citizens to fight climate change. Once trained, the brigade conducts outreach around reduction of GHG emissions in homes and businesses through individual and business climate consultations (which include personalized audits and site-specific recommendations) and attends conferences to speak about the program and distribute literature.

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Pennsylvania

Da Vinci Discovery Center of Science and Technology    $25,825
Bill McGlinn, 3145 Hamilton Boulevard Bypass, Allentown, PA 18103
Community of Modelers
Using the Community of Modelers, the Da Vinci Science Center engages teachers, students, and other community members in using desktop computer-based climate-modeling software, Educators Global Climate Model (EdGCM). The Da Vinci Science Center provides in-depth training workshops and online and in-person follow-up and troubleshooting to enable educators and citizens to use and understand the same global climate modeling software used by environmental scientists. The Da Vinci Center also facilitates an online forum where workshop graduates exchange data and analysis derived from their climate models. Participants become more aware of the consequences of greenhouse gas emissions and better able to use scientific models to make decisions about local, regional, and national climate policy.

Northampton County Area Community College    $25,915
John Leiser, 3835 Green Pond Road, Bethlehem, PA 18020
Farming for the Future: A Model for Community Supported Agriculture
Northampton Community College (NCC) students on the Monroe Campus study the operation of the Josie Porter Farm to see its function as an area of sustainable biodynamic agriculture that provides food within the community it serves. By working the farm and meeting with members of Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), participants are able to recognize the goals of the farm to promote environmental stewardship. Students then work with faculty and the Cherry Valley Community Supported Agriculture (CVCSA) to design a model for demonstrating community supported agriculture enterprises to municipalities working to secure open space and to teach public workshops on the farm around the topics of stewardship and sustainable agriculture. The proposed project is intended to promote sustainable interactions between the population of Monroe County and the wild resources found in the region. Project goals are threefold: (1) to teach students critical thinking about environmental issues so that they analyze information and design realistic environmental solutions to problems, while encouraging the students to adopt sustainable options in their own lives; (2) to educate the local community about the importance of balancing population growth with the need for renewable food resources, and (3) to educate municipal leaders about community supported agriculture by developing a model for incorporating CSA land into open space initiatives.

PA Resources Council    $19,360
David Mazza, 64 South 14th Street, Pittsburgh, PA 15203
Health and the Environment: The Human Connection
This project draws on existing curriculum materials developed by PA Resources Council Inc. and the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute-Center for Environmental Oncology to increase public awareness and knowledge about environmental causes of cancer, minimize the public’s exposure to environmental pollutants and contribute to the prevention of cancer, especially among children, by educating middle and high-school students, their parents or guardians, and teachers and pre-service teachers. Specifically, this curriculum seeks to enhance critical thinking and decision making skills as a means to effectively analyze information and make informed decisions about purchase and use of products and behavioral changes as a means to avoid or reduce pollution exposure. This project encourages participants of all ages to accept responsibility for reducing and eliminating toxins in the environment by decreasing their consumption of products that contain these substances. Participants acquire skills that assist them in making informed decisions concerning conscious consumerism (label reading and alternatives to toxin-containing products).

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Puerto Rico

University of Puerto Rico at Aguadilla    $49,861
Robert Mayer, P. O. Box 6150, Aguadilla, PR 00604-6150
Caribbean Center for the Reduction of Aquatic Debris
The University of Puerto Rico at Aguadilla Caribbean Center for the Reduction of Aquatic Debris delivers workshops for university students, who then conduct workshops with teachers and students in kindergarten through grade 12 and the public on aquatic debris. The program educates both university students and the public on the ways they can be environmental stewards as they take action to change behaviors that affect local and global waters. Nine workshops are provided for university students to prepare them to conduct the educational outreach. They deliver 19 educational workshops for students in kindergarten through grade 12 throughout Puerto Rico and six workshops for the public. The program also conducts four beach and four lake cleanups to involve students and the public in stewardship. In addition, students develop public service announcements that are offered to the media and enhance the marine debris Website.

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Rhode Island

Scituate School Department    $14,895
Shannon Donovan, 197 Danielson Pike, North Scituate, RI 02857
Using Technology in Environmental Monitoring to Promote Natural Resource Conservation
This project trains teachers and students in the use of state-of-the-art mapping technologies. Students learn to use both global positioning systems (GPS) and geological information systems (GIS) for mapping a variety of environmental parameters in the community, including invasive species, nonpoint pollution sources, and water quality monitoring stations. Participants learn about threats to the natural resources and generate management plans as solutions.

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South Carolina

Clemson University    $24,120
William Brown, 300 Brackett Hall, Box 345702, Clemson, SC 29634-5702
Extreme Environment
The purpose of this grant is to provide an opportunity for fourth and fifth grade students from disadvantaged schools to experience environmental education in a natural setting in a way that is interactive and fun, while providing them with learning tools that enable them to be more successful in school. Students attend a 3-day camp at Camp Cooper. The curriculum features four main exercises: Water Quality, Soil Horizons, Forestry, and Amazing Animals. Students examine environmental issues such as testing water quality, collecting soil samples, and learning about the nature of soil, its composition, and its relationship with vegetation, water, and wildlife. This program serves to advance environmental education and as a catalyst for advancing educational reforms.

Earth Force, Inc.    $14,795
Anna Richardson, P.O. Box 22583, 125 Cannon Street, Charleston, SC 29413
Earth Force Beyond the Classroom
Earth Force beyond the Classroom is designed to engage young people as active citizens who can improve the environment and their communities now and in the future. The youth and their adult facilitators are provided the skills, resources, and knowledge to turn their passion for the environment into real and lasting change in their communities. Participants examine the root cause of an issue and focus on sustainable solutions to improve the local environment. The knowledge they gain enables them to assess issues in their community and choose a local environmental problem to address, conduct balanced research so that they understand the problem from a variety of perspectives, and to take action on the issue by implementing a long-term solution.

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South Dakota

Tutuaca Mountain Center    $48,572
Cindy Tolle, 12134 Mountain Goat Center, Custer, SD 57730
The French Creek Watershed Project
This French Creek Watershed Project designs and implements an environmental education program for the Custer School District in Custer County French Creek. The students study French Creek, collect global positioning system (GPS) data, integrate the data into a geographic information system (GIS), and collect water quality data on the drainage. Each grade level contributes to the overall knowledge of the watershed with grade-appropriate activities as dictated by the project. It teaches students about water, using Project WET, Project Wild, Project Learning Tree, and other activities. Information is provided to students through workshops, classroom teachings, and laboratory (both field and classroom) sessions. Teachers in grades kindergarten through 12 in the Custer School District are trained to teach the students. When the project is finished, the students understand the water cycle, the importance of clean water, and how to keep the aquifer healthy.

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Tennessee

Fort Loudon Lake Association    $10,500
Penny Mitchell, 956 Volunteer Landing Lane, Knoxville, TN 37915
Restaurant and Automotive Education Instructions
This instructions project is intended to maintain the water quality of Fort Loudon Lake by educating food service and automotive facilities about preventing stormwater pollutant discharges. This goal is achieved by conducting monthly training workshops to address businesses that have the potential to discharge pollutants such as oil and grease, soapy wash water, antifreeze, and litter into the stormwater that reaches Fort Loudon Lake. Because of the small size and large number of these facilities, local municipalities have difficulty with tracking and regulation. Furthermore, many of these businesses lack the knowledge and resources to address stormwater issues because of the businesses' high employee turnover rate. The educational component introduces best management practices to inform about low-cost, practical solutions that prevent stormwater pollution. The information is disseminated to the business community by a series of training workshops, printed material, and site visits.

Trust for the Future    $18,270
Jennifer Barrie, P.O. Box 60322, Nashville, TN 37206
Kilowatt Ours
The Kilowatt Ours grant is used to increase student, teacher, and administrator understanding of energy issues and foster environmental stewardship by providing tools such as training sessions, classroom presentations, interactive online calculator or “kilowatt counter” kilowatt ours net-zero, and teachers workshops to reduce energy consumption and increase renewable power use in homes and in schools. The Peer Education Program (a component of the Kilowatt Ours Youth Initiative) assigns college students as peer educators in fourth through 12th grade classrooms across the greater Nashville to spend three hour-long class periods working with the younger students to reduce energy consumption and increase use of renewable power in homes and schools.

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Texas

A Nurtured World, Inc.    $90,935
Elizabeth Roothaan, 6404 Wilbur Drive, Austin, TX 78757
Consumer Environmental Education in Texas, Arizona, and Oklahoma
Combining both technical and inquiry learning elements into curriculum is at the heart of A Nurtured World’s model to effectively drive change in environmental behavior. A Nurtured World has developed an innovative inquiry-based curriculum that helps individuals understand and make informed decisions about their personal environmental impacts and ties the environmental impacts to issues important to the individual. Under this project, the curriculum is being expanded and adapted to include materials appropriate for middle school students and to correlate with math, science, and English state standards. Middle school teachers and students learn how to make informed decisions about their behavior and reduce their environmental impact, and high-quality curriculum is provided to participating teachers to help them meet curriculum standards and enhance critical thinking. Two train-the-trainer teacher workshops are being conducted in each state to prepare teachers to effectively deliver all or parts of the curriculum to their students using a combination of classroom and field activities. During the workshops, participants report measurable outcomes from the project, including reductions in environmental impacts and cost savings. These actions help enhance teachers’ skills in delivering technical content and leading inquiry-based discussions related to personal environmental responsibility. Key partners include the Texas Education Agency, Keep Pearland Beautiful, De Soto School District, Yavapai County Education Service Agency, and the Oklahoma Department of Environmental Quality.

Historic Downtown Galveston Partnership    $19,799
Lesley Sommer, 2326 Strand, Galveston, TX 77550
Environmental Stewardship for Historic Downtowns
The Historic Downtown Galveston Partnership, whose mission is to help restore the economic vitality and physical attractiveness of Galveston’s central business district, is going to promote environmental education through the project, Travel Partners. The Travel Partners project engages middle-school children in activities that involve environmental studies. Children from the Galveston area school district promote a healthy environment by encouraging family and friends to walk, vanpool, or ride the train to work. Travel Partners is an earth-saving environmental education fund-raising project for the school. Teachers are trained in the “Drive Clean Across Texas” curriculum and then teach students how to reduce the carbon footprint by using alternative forms of transportation. The Travel Partners competition is a simple, exciting way to raise money for the school by “selling” environmental stewardship instead of candy bars.

Martinez Street Women's Center    $30,433
Joleen Garcia, 1510 S. Hackberry, San Antonio, TX 78210
Maternal and Child Health Education Program: Childhood Lead Prevention Project
The Martinez Street Women’s Center was founded in the summer of 1999 by women from diverse professional backgrounds with a shared goal of creating a community space to promote the health and well-being of women and girls in San Antonio. The center has created a project called the Maternal & Child Health Education Program that helps promote awareness on lead poisoning. A partnership with Family Based Safety Service caseworkers provides the tools to work with case load families and educate them on lead poisoning. Through this partnership, the Lead Poisoning Education Project refers children for free or low-cost lead blood level testing throughout the City of San Antonio. Families in high-risk areas and families through the health educational workshops benefit from this project.

Mothers for Clean Air    $12,132
Rosalia Guerrero-Luera, 3100 Richmond Avenue, Suite 309, Houston, TX 77098
Ozone Theatre: Setting the Stage for Air Pollution Education
This project has developed an interactive Ozone Theatre for middle school students in grades 6 through 8. Ozone Theater is an innovative program that uses theatrical techniques to teach students about air pollution. The program also provides insight into Houston’s particular air quality issues. The new module helps students in grades 6 through 8 to gain a better understanding of local air pollution problems and the associated health effects. Mothers for Clean Air has developed the module, activity guide, and evaluation tools; solicits feedback from middle school students and teachers; and pilot tests the module in three middle schools, reaching both teachers and students. Once developed, this module is expanded to students in Harris, Brazoria, and Galveston Counties, ultimately reaching middle school students throughout the non-attainment area. The goal of this project is to raise student awareness of local air quality and to teach them how to take personal responsibility for responding to unhealthy levels of outdoor air pollution.

Texas Discovery Gardens    $15,000
Fran Anderson, 3601 Martin Luther King Boulevard, Dallas, TX 75210
After-School EE Program
Texas Discovery Gardens is an organic, botanic gardens located in historic Fair Park in Dallas, Texas. The garden has created a program called the “After-School Environmental Education Program” for children to attend after school lets out for the day. Students from local school groups participate in the “Life in the Compost Bin Earthkeepers.” In this program, students focus on sustainable urban development and waste management through composting and recycling education. This program reaches many local households by working with and empowering the children of these communities. The students who participate in this program learn about community stewardship and environmental issues. The student participants develop a community project and conduct outreach programs in their neighborhoods. While they are involved in these outreach programs, the students coordinate with media outlets to produce newsletters and brochures to use in these outreach efforts. The students also produce a short-film documentary of the outreach efforts for use as a public service announcement.

The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston    $21,944
Catherine Moore, P.O. Box 20036, Houston, TX 77225
Environmental Education for Promotoras and Community Health Workers
The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston provides targeted environmental education to promotoras and community health workers working on the Texas and Mexico border and two selected metropolitan areas with high numbers of medically underserved populations. The project develops, demonstrates, and promotes cost-effective, preventive measures to correct multiple health and safety hazards in the home environment that produce serious illness and injuries in children in the low and very low income families. Using a holistic approach to improve indoor air quality, foster lead-safe practices, and implement integrated pest management controls in the home decreases the incidence of asthmatic episodes that may require hospitalization, childhood lead poisoning, and acute pesticide poisoning and result in enhanced environmental awareness and improved corresponding health impacts to the public.

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Utah

Boys and Girls Club of Weber Davis    $17,500
Patricia Bair, 127 24th Street Suite 3, Ogden, UT 84401
Recycling Rangers Elementary Education Program
The Boys & Girls Clubs of Weber-Davis manages nine club sites in Weber and Davis Counties, Utah. The “Recycling Rangers” program encourages environmental community stewardship by educating inner-city children in grades 3 through 6 about the impact of solid waste on the environment and how recycling can make a difference. The ultimate goal of the program is to encourage inner-city families to participate in Ogden City’s curbside recycling program. Children involved in this special program gain a strong sense of responsibility toward the environment and it also teaches members of their family the importance of reducing, reusing, and recycling. The outcome of the experiential program is both fun and educational, involving a variety of classroom and field trip experiences, guest speakers (including rescued animals from the Ogden Nature Center), multi-media presentations, and hands-on activities.

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Vermont

NorthWoods Stewardship Center    $28,900
Luke O'Brien, 154 Leadership Drive, P.O. Box 220, East Charleston, VT 05833
"Power for Change" Community Energy Use Education
The “Power for Change” project increase access to renewable energy education resources both through public outreach and through teacher trained in renewable energy education. Residents and fourth- through eighth-grade students in the northeastern Vermont region participate in site tours, workshops, take-home tool kits, and educational displays on renewable energy alternatives as part of the project. Area schools are reached through interactive field trips to our site as well as programs presented by NorthWoods staff at the schools. Participants learn about the impacts of individual energy choices, efficiency, the costs of and options for renewable energy, and access to renewable energy resources. The NorthWoods Stewardship Center facilitates teacher training workshops to distribute a standards-based “Power for Change” curriculum. The training includes background information, written curriculum materials, and classroom activity kits.

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Virginia

Boxerwood Education Association    $20,256
Hunter Mohring, 963 Ross Road, Lexington, VA 24450
Project Nurturing Environmental Stewardship Together (NEST)
The goal of Project Nurturing Environmental Stewardship Together (NEST) is to enhance integration of environmental education into the curricula and institutional practices of four elementary schools in Rockbridge County, Virginia. Project NEST enhances teaching skills by: (a) modeling effective outdoor teaching and learning strategies to teachers at Boxerwood Nature Center and in schoolyards; (b) introducing high-quality environmental curricula for adaptation to each teacher’s specific school setting; (c) offering teacher workshops in conjunction with the Washington and Lee University (W&L) Teacher Education Program, with special focus on inquiry and project-based learning; and (d) funding modest classroom-initiated environmental stewardship projects that introduce service-learning methodologies while also improving the instructional potential of the schoolyard. Specifically, this project addresses education reform by helping four schools meet expectations set forth in the Business Plan for Environmental Education in the Commonwealth of Virginia. The plan includes goals of creating “outdoor classrooms” at every school to encourage authentic, real-world learning and develop sustained teacher training using an integrated environment-based learning approach.

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University    $25,217
Sharron McElroy, 1880 Pratt Drive, Suite 2006, Blacksburg, VA 24060
Environmental Stewardship and Career Awareness Program for Education
A collaborative relationship among high school student scientists, their teachers, and researchers from Virginia Tech in collecting, interpreting, and sharing environmental data at Mason Neck National Wildlife Refuge is the goal of this project. Students collect data on tree rings, soils, and forest composition and enter this information into an online, digital database. Students also participate in Web-based analysis of the data and scenario-based learning directed toward increasing their critical thinking abilities, their sense of environmental stewardship, and their interest in careers in environmental science.

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Washington

Community Agricultural Development Center    $15,000
Albert Kowitz, 985 S. Elm, Colville, WA 99114
Food and Environmental Stewardship: Food Choices that Support Sustainable Agriculture
The Community Agricultural Development Center (CADC) is partnering with Quillisascut Farms and Washington State University (WSU) Extension in Stevens County to train high school teachers in health and food science programs. They are learning how to evaluate the impacts of food choices on the environment and to prioritize ways to reduce the size of their own and students’ environmental footprint. Teachers from across the State of Washington attend a 5-day training at the Quillisascut Farms training center. The focus is on food choices that result in a healthier diet for students and support a more sustainable food production and distribution system. Issues that are addressed include pesticide use, fertilizers, energy usage, soils, surface and ground water, and animal, vegetable, and fruit production. The hands-on multidisciplinary training on Farm to Table issues changes the ways the group thinks about the food system. The teachers are taught about organic food production, what a local food community is, how environmental stewardship affects purchasing and kitchen practices, and biodiversity and the food environment.

Department of Ecology    $30,000
Cedar Bouta, P.O. Box 47600, Olympia, WA 98504-7600
Hazards on the Homefront Curriculum
The Department of Ecology and King County are revising and widely distributing King County’s “Hazards on the Homefront” curriculum (grades 7 through 12) in association with the ToxicFree Tips household campaign. The curriculum is updated with current resources and new findings related to household hazardous waste and toxics. Teacher trainings are delivered in Yakima, Kitsap, and Lewis Counties to teachers, and the Department of Ecology provides ongoing support to educators. Additional educators access the teacher’s guide either through Web sites or on CDs. The program helps people properly use, store, and dispose of hazardous waste and encourages safer alternatives; increases environmental stewardship, protects health, improves indoor air quality; and reduces environmental impacts from waste; and fosters smarter consumers.

Evergreen State College    $29,611
John McLain, 2700 Evergreen Parkway NW, Academic Grants, SEM II D3105, Olympia, WA 98505
Curriculum for the Bioregion
The goal of the Curriculum for the Bioregion is to infuse the content and concepts of environmental literacy and practices of environmental stewardship and sustainability into a large number of high-enrollment introductory college courses in the Puget Sound bioregion. The project aims for chemistry college faculty members and sociology faculty members to participate in professional development experiences that introduce selected regional environmental issues relevant to introductory chemistry and sociology classes. The teachers examine the environmental curriculum resources that are currently available in these disciplines, work collaboratively to integrate the sustainability concepts with core concepts that they already teach in introductory classes, and introduce and evaluate at least one environmental “Teaching and Learning” activity in each class. They also disseminate their strategies and experiences via the Curriculum for the Bioregion Web site and optionally through professional conferences.

Washington State University    $85,347
Lynda Paznokas, PO Box 642114 School and Community Collaboration Center College of Education, Washington State University, Pullman, WA 99164-2114
Sustainability and Environmental Education for Pre-Service (SEEP)
The Sustainability and Environmental Education for Pre-Service (SEEP) project is a coordinated statewide effort that incorporates training on environmental and sustainability education into teacher preparations to ensure that these concepts and skills are effectively taught in Washington classrooms. The program is managed by Washington State University’s (WSU) College of Education’s School and Community Collaboration Center, on behalf of Teacher of Teacher of Science (TOTOS), a group of science methods professors from Washington’s colleges and universities. Under this program, WSU trains pre-service teachers through several different teacher preparation programs to incorporate and deliver high-quality environmental and sustainability education into the classroom. The training includes: (1) a workshop with governmental agencies and informal science education institutions to discuss human and material environmental resources; (2) a workshop to discuss implementation strategies for evidence-based teacher preparation of environmental and sustainability issues; (3) a regional conference with the Northwest Chapter of the Association of Science Teacher Education; (4) development of collaborative publications that describe SEEP’s models; and (5) environmental equipment support for TOTOS through WSU’s Equipment Loan Program. Ultimately, the SEEP project leads to incorporation of more significant environmental and sustainability education into nearly all pre-service teacher preparation programs throughout the state, thus preparing future teachers to effectively teach these concepts and skills in Washington classrooms. Partners in this project include Washington’s office of Superintendent of Public Instruction, Woodland Park Zoo, Association for Science Teacher Education, Environmental Education Association of Washington, Pacific Education Institute, Facing the Future, and several WSU units.

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West Virginia

Upper Guyandotte Watershed Association, Inc.    $7,103
Val Page, P.O. Box 196, 300 Front Street, Mullens, WV 25882
Community Stewardship Initiative
The Community Stewardship Initiative allows the Upper Guyandotte Watershed Association (UGWA) the ability to reach farther into the watershed through small community forums, public meetings, the media, stream cleanups, and by fostering meaningful partnerships. While it cultivates an enthusiasm for watershed stewardship, UGWA teaches the community about the health risks surrounding untreated wastewater and how to avoid hazardous contact. The goal of the wastewater project is to increase access to adequate wastewater treatment facilities in local communities and reduce human health risks caused by discharges of untreated household wastewater.

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Wisconsin

Northland College    $124,845
Clare Hintz, 1411 Ellis Avenue, Ashland, WI 54806
Regional Collaborative for Sustainability Education
As sustainability becomes a widely embraced concept, more and more local communities and households are attempting to engage in sustainable initiatives. The Regional Collaborative for Sustainability Education uses education as the catalyst for community-based initiatives that engage all aspects of sustainability to maximize the knowledge, interest, and engagement of community members. Teams of educators, administrators, community leaders, and students make up innovative partnerships that engage people and communities in positive change. Northland College is creating and piloting a Transformative Learning Model for Sustainability that exemplifies innovative, place-based approaches to learning, promotes long-term community stewardship, and encourages regional approaches to sustainability education. In addition, Northland College facilitates dialogue on best practices in sustainability education by developing a leadership team and launching a regional Web portal for sustainability education. Regional communities nationwide participate in national conferences to be trained on the Transformative Learning Model for Sustainability. Dissemination of this model results in increased sharing of regional formal and non-formal educator’s best sustainability teaching and learning practices, increased environmental knowledge and public awareness, and increased exchange of local, regional, and national expertise. Key partners in this project are Shelburne Farms, the Cooperative Educational Service Agency, Northern Great Lakes Visitor Center, the Alliance for Sustainability, and the Wisconsin Indianhead Technical College.

The Board of Regents of the University of Wisconsin System    $122,668
Cheryl Bauer-Armstrong, 21 North Park Street, Suite 6401, Madison, WI 53715-1218
RESTORE: Children and Nature
The University of Wisconsin (UW)-Madison Arboretum’s Earth Partnership for Schools (EPS) program uses ecological restoration of school grounds as a means of reforming educational practice in science, math, social studies, language, and the arts. As part of the program, students study site history, measure physical and observe aesthetic features, analyze soil, and learn the biology of native ecosystems through an inquiry-based learning and a hands-on collaborative setting. The RESTORE: Children and Nature initiative is designed to reconnect children and nature by expanding EPS to a broader nationwide audience, leading to improved teaching skills, enhanced student learning, and citizen involvement in restoring local environments. As part of this initiative, pilot partnerships are established with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) and regional partners to nationally expand the unique EPS model. During the project, environmental education and conservation organizations are recruited as Earth Partnership Facilitating Centers. Teams from the centers, consisting of non-formal educators, kindergarten through grade 12 teachers, and citizen volunteers, attend a 2-week RESTORE Institute at the UW-Madison Arboretum to be trained in offering EPS programs to teams from local and regional schools and communities. In addition, FWS resource personnel attend 2-day trainings in their states and collaborate in regional institutes and the subsequent schoolyard habitat projects. This project addresses several key issues, including biodiversity, ecological restoration, pollution prevention, and ecological literacy. Key partners in this initiative include the FWS Schoolyard Habitat Program, National Conservation Training Center, Oklahoma Partners for Fish and Wildlife, Great Plains Nature Center and Dyck Arboretum of the Plains, Prairie Wetlands Learning Center, Upper Mississippi River National Fish and Wildlife Refuge, La Crosse District, and regional EPS Facilitating Centers in Wisconsin, Kansas, and Minnesota.

Wisconsin Children's Center/Madison Children's Museum    $10,000
Allison Hildebrandt, 100 State Street, Madison, WI 53703
Leap into Lakes
Leap into Lakes is an inquiry-based, hands-on experience that immerses young children in the underwater world of lake critters and plants and plays on their innate connection to living creatures while connecting them to larger ecological concepts such as stewardship. Leap into Lakes addresses the educational priorities of promoting stewardship, health and teaching skills by bringing scientifically sound curriculum to classrooms to educate children, parents and teachers about the basic concepts surrounding Wisconsin waterways and freshwater ecosystems, the importance of clean water and its relation to health and to build teacher capacity and confidence in science education in head start classrooms, preschools, and family child care programs. The project is delivered to preschools throughout the Madison metropolitan region and at community events.

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Wyoming

Fremont County School District #14    $36,707
Cheryl Williams, 638 Blue Sky Highway, Ethete, WY 82520
Wyoming Indian Elementary School After School Ecology Program
The Wyoming Indian Elementary School after School Ecology program is an intensive after-school science program for students in grades 2 through 4 from the Wind River Indian Reservation who have never had any formal exposure to science. The program strives to improve chronically poor student achievement through field experiences that encourage cultural and ecological stewardship of the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Its three main objectives are (1) to improve poor academic achievement by engaging students in science education; (2) to provide inquiry-based, culturally relevant field ecology to underserved students; and (3) to encourage local environmental and cultural stewardship and overall appreciation for the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. This school program brings together Eastern Shoshone and Northern Arapaho students with academics whose research focuses on the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem with the hope that students benefit from the direct experiences of resource professionals and that resource professionals recognize the various cultural and economic conditions within the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem. Future stewardship of the ecosystem relies on both.

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