This project provides funding to the hitchcock center for the environment to implement its project, which will design, demonstrate, and disseminate environmental education practices, methods, and…

This Project Grant award from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) under the Environmental Education Grants Program (CFDA 66.951) provides $106,708 to the Hitchcock Center for the Environment to implement an environmental education initiative in the Connecticut River Valley of Western Massachusetts.

The project will design, demonstrate, and disseminate environmental education practices, methods, and techniques to increase environmental literacy and encourage pro-environmental behaviors in communities in the region. Key activities include developing four environmental engineering design challenges, creating professional development videos, facilitating field trips to the Hitchcock Center's Living Building, and supporting student-developed climate action plans. The project will partner with four Title I schools to provide educational programming to approximately 20 classrooms and 400 fifth-grade students. The award includes $20,000 in sub-awards to these partner schools to offset program implementation costs. The project is expected to run from August 1, 2024 to July 31, 2026.

This project provides funding to the hitchcock center for the environment to implement its project, which will design, demonstrate, and disseminate environmental education practices, methods, and techniques that will serve to increase environmental literacy and encourage behavior that will benefit the environment in communities in the connecticut river valley of western massachusetts. The grantee will partner with four title I schools to offer environmental educational programming to approximately 20 classrooms and 400 fifth grade students. The recipient will provide participating classrooms with four environmental engineering design challenges to 20 classrooms on a range of topics including, but not limited to water filtration, stormwater management, rainwater capture, and air quality, a field trip to the hitchcock center's living building, and resources to support student-created climate action plans. Activities:this project will increase public awareness and knowledge about environmental issues in the connecticut river valley of western massachusetts and provide students at title I schools with the skills necessary to make informed decisions and to take responsible actions to support student-created climate action plans. Activities to be performed during this project period include: planning with schools and partners, developing materials for the environmental engineering challenges, building a framework for experiential learning, implementation of the four design challenges, a field trip to the hitchcock center's living building, student-developed climate action plans, program evaluation, and sharing of program evaluation findings. Subrecipient:the recipient proposes four fixed amount subawards at $5,000 each totaling $20,000, in accordance with the 25% requirement described in the application guidance. The subaward funds will be awarded to support school participation in this project and offset the costs of program implementation. Subrecipients will work with the hitchcock center to facilitate field trips to the hitchcock center's living building. Additionally, subrecipient schools will use subaward funds to purchase materials for their 5TH grade students to conduct the project's four environmental engineering challenges and to conduct a climate action project. All subaward funds will be partially awarded upon completion of the following milestones: completion of field trips by all participating 5TH grade classes to the hitchcock center's living building ($1,000), acquisition of all materials for the environmental design challenges ($2,000), and completion of the student action projects by all participating 5TH grade classes ($2,000). Outcomes:IT is anticipated that this project will result in the following deliverables: 4 sustainable design and engineering challenges, 4 professional development videos for each of the design and engineering challenges, a fieldtrip to the hitchcock center for 20 classrooms, development of student climate action plans, and the development of an experiential learning model that aligns with curriculum standards. Expected outcomes of the project include: evaluation surveys demonstrating increase in teacher experiential teaching skills, increased school capacity to implement experiential learning related to climate change, increase in student and teacher understanding of nature-based solutions, increase in local understanding of environmental challenges and solutions, increased integration of experiential learning into title I school curriculum, increased awareness and adoption of nature-based solutions, and increased capacity of local communities to build resiliency and engage in climate-change solutions. The intended beneficiaries include 20 classrooms and 400 fifth grade students from title I school districts representing low-income rural communities in the connecticut river valley of western massachusetts.