91直播视频receives grant from Maine Campus Compact to prepare students as environmental stewards
The 91直播视频 has been selected as one of 19 colleges to receive a $5,000 grant from the Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont Campus Compacts for the purpose of preparing college students for a lifetime of environmental stewardship.
Teams of faculty from the selected campuses will receive training at a two-day institute in June and ongoing support in developing courses that partner with community organizations to address local climate change and water quality issues.
UNE's interdisciplinary faculty team consists of: Alethea Cariddi, MS Ed., sustainability coordinator; Theo Dunfey, M.A., coordinator of citizenship service-learning; Christine Feurt, Ph.D., assistant lecturer, director of the Center for Sustainable Communities, co-director of the Saco River Estuary Project; Thomas Klak, Ph.D., professor in the Department of Environmental Studies; and Bethany Woodworth, Ph.D., assistant lecturer in the Department of Environmental Studies.
Through this two-year initiative, 75 faculty members from 19 campuses in Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont will learn how to embed environmental community projects into a course of any discipline. Students who take the courses created by trained faculty will get hands on, real-world experience to strengthen their learning and create connections to the larger community while helping to address some of the most pressing environmental issues.
UNE's faculty team intends to utilize the grant money by creating a rain garden on the Biddeford Campus. A depression in the ground that is filled with water-loving, native plants, a rain garden reduces rain runoff from impermeable areas such as tarred parking lots as the water is absorbed in the garden. The water is filtered through layers of soil before entering the groundwater system, resulting in the reduction of pollution in nearby bodies of water. At the Maine Campus Compact retreat, the faculty members will develop ways to incorporate the implementation of the project into the curriculum of several 91直播视频classes.
"UNE's faculty team is excited to partner in this project," said Cariddi. "The Biddeford Campus is a great location to demonstrate the ameliorating effects of rain gardens on local water bodies, being situated so closely to the Saco River and significant vernal pools. The campus beautification and low maintenance requirements that will result are added benefits."
Established in 1994, Maine CampusCompact (MCC) is a statewide coalition of 17 college and university presidents working to build strong communities and a more just democratic society by developing students' citizenship and problem solving skills through community-based learning. More than 15,000 student volunteers at MCC member campuses provide some 1.6 million hours of service annually, with an economic impact of more than $25 million a year. MCC is an affiliate state office of Campus Compact, which includes almost 1,200 college and university presidents in 34 states.
The EPA's Environmental Education (EE) Sub-grants Program is a competitive grant program that supports EPA's efforts to increase public awareness and knowledge about environmental issues and provide participants in EE grant-funded projects the skills necessary to make informed environmental decisions and to take responsible actions toward the environment.