Natural Resources: Stormwater Education Methods

See Schedule of Courses for specific titles.

Course is online with required in-person workshops July 30 and 31, 9:00-4:30pm, and synchronous online meetings Aug 4, 4:00-5:00 and Aug 7, 3:00-5:00

The course is designed as a 1-credit course. It will introduce students (especially in-service teachers) to the concept of stormwater management within a watershed context. Goals include augmenting student understanding of the definition and movement of stormwater and its and impacts as it moves across the land and into surface waterbodies, and on improving their understanding of nature-based solutions that can be implemented to treat and absorb stormwater on-site, thereby reducing water pollution. The course is structured to introduce and engage students in use of a stormwater stewardship curriculum, Soaking Up Stormwater Through Stewardship in the Lake Champlain Basin with their classes. Following participation in the course, students will be able to confidently implement the curriculum with upper elementary, middle and/or high school students or others with interest in stormwater management and nature-based solutions. To become familiar with curriculum content, course participants will engage in a variety of hands-on learning activities, dialogues in person and through a course discussion board, readings/videos/podcasts, a webinar, a written plan/reflection, and presentations. The course will also provide participants with information about opportunities to implement various green stormwater infrastructure practices on school campuses through the Green Schools program. Learning Outcomes After completing this course, participants will be able to: • Describe and explain to others what a watershed is and what stormwater is; • Identify possible sources of pollutants that can be transported by stormwater on school grounds or in local communities; • Illustrate the possible flow paths stormwater may take on school grounds or in a local community to reach a local waterway or storm drain; • Compare and contrast types of green stormwater infrastructure (GSI) practices, their uses and maintenance requirements; • Illustrate how at least one type of green stormwater infrastructure works to treat and reduce stormwater runoff; • Construct a model GSI practice and evaluate its ability to reduce and clean stormwater runoff; • Inventory a site and consider GSI practices that might be used to treat and minimize stormwater runoff; • Make a plan of how to engage upper elementary, middle or high school students in use of the Soaking Up Stormwater curriculum; • Make recommendations of how to address challenges identified during planning.

The course will be carried out via two all day in-person trainings followed by two synchronous webinars. Supporting asynchronous videos /podcasts will be used to support course participants in implementing the Soaking Up Stormwater curriculum. In addition to active participation in the synchronous sessions, students will make a plan of how they will implement a minimum of three activities with an upper elementary, middle, or high school class. Within this plan, they should provide a brief summary of potential challenges that may exist when they implement the selected activities and develop recommendations to address those challenges with implementing the activities. During the course, students will be asked to: • Actively participate in hands-on learning of key curriculum components and course dialogues (via in-person activities and dialogues July 31 and August 1 and via remote active participation on August 4 (4-5 pm) and August 7 (3-5 pm); • Read educational documents, watch short videos and/or listen to podcasts to broaden understanding of stormwater, stormwater management, and green infrastructure as a nature-based solution to stormwater management; • Develop a plan of how they plan to engage upper elementary, middle, or high school students to implement a minimum of three Soaking Up Stormwater curriculum activities; • Develop a written reflection describing potential challenges of activities to be implemented and recommendations to address those challenges; and • At the final remote class meeting, present a summary of activities planned to be implemented, challenges and recommendations.

Students will be graded on participation in the in-person and remote portions of the course using a pre-defined rubric. Their summary and presentation will also be graded with pre-defined rubrics that are described in detail within the syllabus.