Region 1: EPA New England

Environmental Education Grants Federal Fiscal Year 1998

Connecticut | Maine | Massachusetts | New Hampshire | Rhode Island | Vermont

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Connecticut

CT Audubon Coastal Center (CACC)
Grant Amount: $5,000
Planning Workshops for Milford's Open Space Steering Committee
1 Milford Point Road
Milford, CT 06460
Contact: Barbara Milton (203) 878-7440

CACC will host six bimonthly workshops to representatives of Milford's Open Space Steering Committee covering topics of natural resources inventories, low impact development, wetlands and waterfront open space, open space management, funding and acquisition of open space, and development of slide presentations. Approximately 20 representatives of various agencies will attend the workshops. Presentations developed from the workshops are expected to reach thousands of people.

CTDEP-Division of Environmental Education
Grant Amount: $18,950
CT Food, Land, & People Project
79 Elm Street
Hartford, CT 06106-5127
Contact: Steven Fish (860) 424-3642

Project Food, Land & People developed a teaching model curriculum focusing on agriculture and environmental concepts and issues which has been field tested with 72 teachers. DEP and partners build upon the initial model to distribute the curriculum throughout the state to PreK-12th grade teachers. A culturally diverse mix of students in all grades is targeted. Twenty-five teachers are trained to turn around and train other teachers.

New Haven Land Trust
Grant Amount: $5,000
Youth Environmental Education Program
P.O. Box 935
New Haven, CT 06504
Contact: Sylvia Dorsey (203) 466-7701

This is a summer environmental education pilot program for youth ages 7-12 years old to design and develop seven community gardens. Environmental education teaching methodology will occur through hands-on activities with youth in the gardens. Community gardens are in low-income and culturally-diverse neighborhoods. The program expects to reach about 150 people.

Save the Sound, Inc.
Grant Amount: $5,000
Estuarine Habitat Restoration Job
185 Magee Avenue
Stamford, CT 06902
Contact: T. Robins Brown (203) 327-9786

The project develops and tests a training program in estuarine habitat restoration for 25 high school students annually. Each student will spend 200 hours in hands-on learning about how to restore estuarine habitats.

Soundwaters, Inc.
Grant Amount: $5,000
Discovering Long Island Sound
Brewers Yacht Haven Marina
69 Dyke Lane, Box 13
Stamford, CT 06902
Contact: Nathan Frohling (203) 323-1978

"Discover Long Island Sound: Bringing it Back to the Classroom" is a multi-disciplinary five-day marine ecology workshop for teachers aboard the Schooner Soundwaters and at several field sites. The goals of the workshop are to inform teachers about Long Island priorities and provide them the skills, materials and resources necessary to teach about these priorities. It is expected that up to 25 teachers will participate in the workshop and more that 500 students will participate in a classroom or outdoor activity, led by a SoundWaters educator.

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Maine

Aroostook Literacy Coalition
Grant Amount: $5,000
Networking Resources Teacher Training
P.O. Box 190
Houlton, ME
Contact: Ervin MacDonald (207) 532-6554

This project will deliver Internet access training directed to educating teachers and faculty about environmental resources. The training will lead to classroom projects incorporating critical thinking, problem-solving, and effective decision making skills centered on human health issues and high priority environmental issues to the region. The planners anticipate that 25 Internet training units will involve 200 teachers in 8 hours of Internet access training.

University of Maine - Water Research Institute
Grant Amount: $11,406
"Testing the Waters" Discovering the Penobscot River Watershed Office of Research & Sponsored Programs
5717 Corbett Hall
Orono, ME 04469-5717
Contact: Jeffery S. Kahl (Technical) (207)-581-3286
Charlene Kimball (business) (207)-581-1478

The Testing the Waters (TTW) program will provide a hands-on water quality monitoring and educational experience for more than 1,000 students grades K-16 and teachers along the Penobscot River. This year's program builds on previous pilot TTW events. Participants will collect water samples at over 40 stations. Field testing kits will be used to analyze the samples. Staff from Maine DEP, Project WET, and other groups will provide assistance with the training.

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Massachusetts

Alternatives for Community & Environment (ACE)
Grant Amount: $5,000
Environmental Justice Youth Educators
2343 Washington Street, 2nd fl
Roxbury, MA 02119
Contact: Penn Loh (617) 442-3343 x24

ACE seeks to recruit 8-12 youth, ages 14-21, to educate their peers and community on the broader health impacts of indoor and outdoor air pollution. ACE's program includes the Roxbury Environmental Empowerment Project which will work with the recruits to educate the predominately low income and culturally diverse community of Roxbury through newsletter, workshops, and trainings.

Clean Water Fund (CWF)
Grant Amount: $4,800
Breaking the Pesticide Habit: To Protect Children's Health
76 Summer Street, 6th Fl
Boston, MA 02110
Contact: Lee Ketelsen (617) 423-4661

Their "Breaking the Pesticides Habit" seeks to educate parents and school and park personnel about the dangers of the misuse of pesticides. CWF will work with parent-teacher organizations in Haverhill, MA to educate the full parent and teacher community in at least 10 schools, reaching approximately 2,000 parents with written materials and engaging about 300 in workshops. Pesticides are widely used and can have health impacts on children. Education on the use of pesticides and safer alternatives will be given to parents to further increase the health and safety of the children.

Eagle Eye Institute, Inc. (EEI)
Grant Amount: $25,000
"Learn about the Forest"
36 Hancock Street
Somerville, MA 02144
Contact: Anthony Sanchez (617) 776-1238

EEI provides hands-on environmental education to 300-350 urban youth for ages 8-22 years old. "Learn About the Forest" involves outdoor programs that use interactive and hands on methods to teach skills in problem solving, group dynamics, and decision-making. EEI. provides disadvantaged youth with hands-on learning about the importance, health and care of trees and the ecosystem of the urban environment in which they live in a one-time, three hour program or series of programs in the spring and fall. During the summer, EEI provides one and three day programs in a rural setting using trees and the forest as the central organizing focus. 15-20 youth and their counselors participate in these programs. EEI also gives youth the opportunity to work in their own neighborhood through recycling, tree planting, and pruning.

Earth Works Projects, Inc.
Grant Amount: $5,000
Urban Orchards Outdoor Classrooms Expansion
11 Green Street
Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Contact: Bill Taylor (617) 983-9463

The Urban Orchards Outdoor Classroom Program works with teachers and youth to plant and care for fruit and nut trees, shrubs, and vines at 15 schools, children K-2 and grade 5, or in an after-school program and uses the schoolyard orchards to teach about food production and ecosystems. The goal of the program is to adapt curriculum for an afterschool framework. Teacher training and workshops help teachers test and use activities at existing Urban Orchard Sites.

Jobs for Youth-Boston, Inc. (JFY)
Grant Amount: $ 25,000
Linking Environmental Education and Environmental Justice to Careers
125 Tremont Street
Boston, MA 02108
Contact: Paula Paris (617) 338-0815

This program increases the number of low-income community residents employed in environmental fields through training. Students will receive environmental training, academic preparation, OSHA certification, applied skills training in Hazardous Waste Treatment and Geographic Information System, and job placement. There will be two training cycles with a 20-25 student capacity per cycle.

Old Colony YMCA-Taunton
Grant Amount: $5,000
Taunton YMCA Earth Services Corps
71 Cohannet Street
Taunton, MA 02789
Contact: Scott Clark (508) 823-3320

This project forms an Earth Service Corps at this YMCA to strengthen and diversify the youth environmental movement in Taunton and to improve environmental education strategies targeting residents of low and moderate income housing. The first year emphasis will be on developing a dedicated cadre of youth leaders who will be encouraged to focus on improving recycling and composting efforts in the City. The grant money will be spent on team-building activities, retreats and field trips, transportation and project materials.

University of Massachusetts, Boston
Grant Amount: $5,000
Watershed Education
100 Morrissey Boulevard
Boston, MA 02125
Contact: Barbara Robinson (617) 287-7654 or Stephen Kiser (617) 287-5712

This project focuses on designing and implementing a model in the Neponset River Watershed (NepRW) that educates watershed community citizens and officials about pertinent environmental issues through website dissemination, media coverage, and public meetings. The development of the website provides information and educational materials about the Neponset River Watershed issues. The NepRW has over 500 members with hundreds of volunteers expect to be educated by the project.

Westport River Watershed Alliance, Inc. (WRWA)
Grant Amount: $5,000
Watershed Education Project: Estuary Curriculum
P.O. Box 1054
1151 Main Street
Westport, MA 02790
Contact: Gay Gillespie or Jessica Harris (508) 636 3016

WRWA and the Westport Community Schools have been partners for 5 years while developing and implementing the Watershed Education Program (WEP), an interdisciplinary environmental education curriculum that focuses on watershed ecology and issues. WEP intends to significantly improve and expand the curriculum to include field studies and link weather monitoring. WEP compliments existing school curricula with a series of thematic multi disciplinary kits, teacher guides, and workshops. WEP tries to provide students the skills to understand the valuable natural resources in the region and increase environmental awareness among students in the Westport River watershed.

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New Hampshire

Great Bay Stewards
Grant Amount: $14,990
Great Bay Ecology Club mentor
89 Depot Road
Stratham, MA 03885
Contact: Karen Acerno (603) 778-0015

The Great Bay Kid's Ecology Club combines estuary-based enrichment/stewardship activities for at-risk youth through fun, hands-on activities led by college students. 36-40 at-risk youth from 4th and 5th grades chosen by guidance professionals. Youth will participate in one Saturday activity lesson every two weeks from September through May.

NH Project Learning Tree (PLT)
Grant Amount: $5,000
PLT in the Androscoggin River Valley
54 Portsmouth Street
Merrimack County
Concord, NH 03301
Contact: Esther Cowles (603) 226-0160

NHPLT and partners will design teacher workshops. NHPLT hosts up to three teacher workshops that will train elementary and high school teachers and other educators in the PLT curriculum. At least 35 educators from the Androscoggin River Valley are expected to attend the workshops. Sustainable forestry, biological diversity, economic viability of the forest-products industry, and public land management are some of the issues the workshops will tackle. Following the workshops, at least one forest field day is offered to managed and unmanaged forest lands and/or facilities that process local natural resources. NHPLT continues to work with participating teachers to continue working together beyond the project period.

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Rhode Island

Environment Council of RI Education Fund, Inc. (Ed Fund)
Grant Amount: $5,000
Building the Foundation for a Comprehensive Envir. Ed. Program for RI
P.O. Box 40568
Providence, RI 02940
Contact: Guy Lefebyre (401) 727-8154

The RI EdFund seeks to include environmental education into the curricula of elementary and secondary schools throughout the state via current education reform efforts. Ed Fund will form 10 three-member teams to assess environmental education curricula. They will also attempt to establish a contact at each of the 416 schools in RI to keep them aware of quality environmental education materials. The Ed Fund also proposes to establish an environmental education web page to build, update, and make each school's contact person available to the environmental education community.

Keep Providence Beautiful (KPB)
Grant Amount: $5,000
Green Team Environmental Education
385 Westminister Street
Providence RI 02903
Contact: Laura Archambault (401) 351-6440

KPB has organized "Green Teams" to educated minority youth ages 14-18 about the importance of a clean, safe, and beautiful neighborhood. In the summer, 13 teams will pick up litter in their assigned neighborhoods and plant and maintain public spaces. In the winter the teams apply what they have learned by assisting with KPB environmental clubs in the local elementary schools. An environmental educator will teach the importance of safe solid waste management and how to design and plant environmentally sustainable public spaces. The educator visits each team to reinforce the lessons taught and insure transformation projects are sound. The educator will also assist members to transfer their summer experience to the winter elementary school environmental clubs.

The Salt Ponds Coalition
Grant Amount: $5,000
Innovative On-Site Wastewater Trt. Student Produced Video
P.O. Box 875
Charlestown, RI 02813
Contact: Brenda Dillman (401) 364-0034

This project creates a student-produced, 15-minute video on wastewater management in RI. The video overviews state and local septic system regulations and an array of advanced wastewater technologies currently being piloted. On-site wastewater disposal systems are a high priority environmental issue in RI. The students along with active community environmental groups ensure the education and environmental message and distribution of the video.

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Vermont

The Gailer School at Middlebury
Grant Amount: $5,000
"Summer Field Biology Program"
19 Shannon Street
Middlebury, VT 05753
Contact: Mary Jeanne Pacher (802) 287-4284

The Summer Field Biology Study Program educates youth and their instructors in the actual tools and techniques of field biology exploration in timber harvest practices and water quality. Field work includes measuring a variety of water quality indicators (i.e. alkalinity, temperature) Forest management professionals will lead exercises on sustainable management and over-cutting. Current resources of Projects WILD and Learning Tree and others will be used as starting points on which to add. The project expects to attract a diverse audience: 19 high school and middle school teachers (4 from China) and 25 students (10 from China) from grades 9-12.

Vermont Institute for Natural Science (VINS)
Grant Amount: $24,854
Updating and Revising Hands-On Nature & the ELF Curriculum
RR 2, Box 532
Woodstock, VT 05091
Contact: Billi Gosh (802) 457-2779 x 109

This project will improve one of VINS' model curricula, Environmental Learning for the Future (ELF) and its companion book Hands-On Nature. VINS partners with 68 schools and 1,300 ELF volunteer educators in VT who learn new teaching skills and pilot-test revised ELF activities. VINS intends to improve the book Hands-On Nature currently consisting of 33 units of fact-filled essays that introduce educators to the topic, followed by field-tested activities for students in grades K-6. ELF sold over 20,000 copies of the book and distributed more than 4,500 of the past copy of Hands-On Nature and expects to get even better distribution with the updated version.