The Friends of Dragon Run (FODR) recently received a $16,264 grant from Dominion Energy to help establish the Dragon Run Environmental Academy Mentorship.
The program was created to train and mentor leaders and educators that serve life science students, said FODR Vice President Carol Kauffman.
Experienced educators and naturalists will train invited middle school teachers from Middlesex, Gloucester and Mathews counties and other Middle Peninsula communities on the importance of the Dragon Run watershed today while also emphasizing the historical uses of the watershed by indigenous peoples and early European colonists.
The primary text that will be used for planning will be “An Educator’s Guide to the Meaningful Watershed Educational Experience (MWEE),” said Kauffman.
Once the educators are trained, educational field trips to the Dragon Run watershed will be planned for their students during the 2023-2024 school year.
Kauffman shared a quote from the educator’s guide, which says, “MWEEs represent sustained activity that engages students from beginning to end. Though a field experience may occur on one day, the total duration leading up to and following the experience involves a variety of rich learning opportunities spread over a course of a unit or multiple units.”
In other words, she said, “Students will be able to answer ‘How will YOU save the Dragon?’”
“We are excited about providing this opportunity to local educators and students,” Kauffman added. “The Dragon Run watershed is truly a unique gift we have here on the Middle Peninsula.”
Friends of Dragon Run was among 35 environmental organizations across Virginia that received a total of $400,000 in grants from Dominion Energy for projects aimed at helping provide “a more sustainable future in the communities that we serve,” said a press release from Dominion.
Altogether, Dominion provided $1.3 million in grant funding for 97 organizations in eight states, said the release. The funding supported a wide-ranging variety of projects, such as preserving wetlands, creating parks and equestrian trails, providing free seeds to promote home gardening and pollinator conservation, recycling waste vegetable oil into biodiesel fuel, and purchasing a river water cleaning vessel.
(Story courtesy of Gloucester-Mathews Gazette-Journal)
