On the Block
by Justin McCaughan
"There’s always one student who doesn’t dress for the occasion," Sehome High School biology teacher Sue Blethen said. "It was the middle of winter and I remember a 10th-grade girl who must have forgotten we were going out to the apple orchard. She ended up coming to class wearing high heels."
Blethen taught her Sehome High School students about air quality under an Environmental Protection Agency-funded environmental education program.
"This girl spent the entire time punching holes in the soggy, wet ground," Blethen said. "She toughed it out, though; her feet were wet and she was whining, but knew she had an obligation to her group."
In 1990, President George H. W. Bush signed the National Environmental Education Act. The act created the Office of Environmental Education, a division of the EPA responsible for administering environmental education grant funds and supporting environmental education programs. Thirteen years later, the office faces the possibility of losing all of its funding.
On Feb. 4, 2002, President George W. Bush released his fiscal year 2003 budget request, including an Office of Management and Budget recommendation that would effectively close the Office of Environmental Education created by his father. The current Bush administration requested that the office’s funding be transferred to the National Science Foundation’s math and science program.
As it stands, any entities nationwide that are requesting environmental education grant funds from the EPA have no guarantee that funds will be available this year or ever again, depending upon whether Congress approves Bush’s proposal.
The changes are a result of the 2003 White House proposed budget, in which the administration labeled environmental education "ineffective." Sally Hanft, EPA Region 10 environmental education grant coordinator and an avid supporter of the program, said she objects to that assessment.
"We don’t agree with that because we think that we’ve been effective and affected a lot of students and teachers," Hanft said.
She said she worries that funds transferred to the National Science Foundation might emerge as grants intended for large programs or projects, leaving more localized ones without funding.
"What we’ve seen (the Foundation) do is large research kind of grants," Hanft said. "So, they could just take the whole pot of money and give it to one organization and they wouldn’t get down to the local level."
She said she believes that local programs have the greatest potential to make a positive difference in the environment.
"Often the catalyst for learning about the environment occurs at the community level," Hanft said. "Teachers, environmental professionals and even scout leaders often have wonderful ideas to raise awareness about environmental issues. With a little community support and some funding from the EPA, they turn those ideas into an educational experience."
Joy Monjure, environmental resources education coordinator for the City of Bellingham, said she believes environmental education programs are important for the future of the planet.
"If we don’t start thinking about the planet we won’t have one; we’ll lose it all," she said. "The people in Bellingham are very sheltered as to what is going on worldwide. We think everywhere is as beautiful and pristine as Bellingham. It’s not. Environmental education is what is allowing us to keep it beautiful."
Bellingham-based RE Sources sponsored Northwest AirNET, the program that Sue Blethen and her students participated in during the 1997-98 school year. AirNET, based on a New England program, teaches students about air quality issues. The majority of the $13,275 grant came from the Office of Environmental Education. The grant funded the project in Whatcom, Skagit and Island counties.
Northwest AirNET sponsored a teacher in-service training workshop in the fall of 1997 for high school science teachers involved in the project.
Lisa Friend, special projects coordinator at RE Sources, helped design and adapt the program to work in Northwest Washington.
"We taught the teachers how to deal with the equipment and materials," Friend said. "I’m really glad we had a chance to establish a program like that in Whatcom County."
Students taking part in the program learned to evaluate air quality by identifying important bio-indicators, such as lichens, whose absence warns of possible problems in the environment. At select schools, students communicated their research with peers at other schools in an Internet-based newsgroup.
"I think the greatest benefit of the AirNET program was that it gave focus and purpose to studying organisms," Blethen said. "The students will see the importance of bio-indicators for the future and what they tell us about our environment."
Blethen said she believes support of quality programs like AirNET is important.
"I was involved in a corporately sponsored program in later years," Blethen said. "They just didn’t do as good of a job. The RE Sources program was just much better."
Approximately 8,700 students of varying ages in 345 classrooms viewed presentations given by RE Sources during the program’s first year.
"The key to educating students about the environment is to pique their curiosity," Blethen said.
In a RE Sources survey of three participating high school classes, results indicated that students in general had "increased knowledge and a (positive) change in attitude" as a result of the presentations.
In another effort to increase awareness, the City of Bellingham is currently applying for an Office of Environmental Education grant of its own.
Monjure is organizing a project that will place wastewater sump-pumps at 10 locations in the city. The pumps will transfer carwash runoff into the city sewer system rather than Whatcom County rivers and streams. Pumps will be available to nonprofit organizations, such as youth groups, to use in the parking lots of designated businesses.
"I like the idea of kids taking responsibility in environmental issues," she said.
Monjure stresses that the program would still exist without the EPA Office of Environmental Education funds, but the impact of such a program would be reduced without the funding to let people know about it.
"What we’re asking from the EPA is grant money which would go towards the purchase of educational materials," she said.
While the City of Bellingham has the funding necessary to buy the pumps, it currently lacks funding to educate the public about the program, Monjure said.
Although the EPA is currently accepting grant applications, Hanft made it clear that the availability of these funds is not guaranteed.
Both the House and Senate have moved to preserve environmental education at the EPA and fund it at the fiscal year 2002 amount of $9.16 million. Until a Veterans Administration/Housing and Urban Development bill is approved, however, the future of environmental education remains uncertain because funding for the Office of Environmental Education is within that bill.
Bush’s plan to end funding for the office could put programs across the country in jeopardy. Blethen said she hopes continued support is given to environmental education programs. She said she believes children genuinely want to learn about the environment and the issues that affect it.
"I think part of human nature, after meeting physiological needs, is to learn about our environment," Blethen said. "As human population increases, it’s becoming more important than ever to look at our effects on the environment and create an informed society."