Step Forward | National Environmental Education Week Looks Toward Earth Day

National Environmental Education Week: April 12-18

Now in its fifth year, Environmental Education Week’s 2009 theme, Be Water Wise!, will be celebrated with K-12 activities across the country. EE Week is the largest organized environmental education event in the United States.

EE Week builds upon the educational impact of Earth Day by creating a full week of educational preparation and activities in classrooms, nature centers, parks, zoos, museums and aquariums, nationwide, promoting understanding and protection of the natural world. In essence, EE Week supports the development of the next generation of environmental stewards.

In support of EE Week’s 2009 water conservation theme, more than 2,000 partner organizations around the country, and millions of students, will participate in water quality testing, school water audits, and activities designed to reinforce the importance of protecting and conserving this most important resource.

“Environmental Education Week is bigger than ever, and this year’s theme, Be Water Wise, is particularly timely,” reports Diane Wood, president of the National Environmental Education Foundation, the Washington, D.C.-based organization that coordinates EE Week. “The enthusiasm for environmental education is growing. It’s an essential component of education. EE Week is an ideal way to integrate environmental content into class curricula and to prepare students for a changing world in which all jobs are rapidly becoming green jobs.”

Step Forward!

Here are just a few ways you can participate in NEE Week with your own children, a local school group or youth organization:

• Create a backyard or schoolyard wildlife habitat.
  The National Wildlife Federation provides guidance at the Certified Wildlife Habitat website.
• Plant native trees.
  The National Arbor Day Foundation offers an online tool to help you choose.
• Volunteer to maintain or create trails for biking and walking.
  Rails to Trails advocates will point the way.
• Take a group to your local zoo, aquarium, or nature center.
  Enter your state at www.aza.org/FindZooAquarium/ for links to members of the American Zoo and Aquarium Association.
• Volunteer at a Nature Center.
  Find one near you at http://www.eeweek.org/nature_centers.htm
• Participate in the Great American Cleanup.
  Find a Great American Clean Up event near you, or learn how to organize your own event.

Events in April

• National Garden Month
  
• Children & Nature Awareness Month
  
• Focus the Nation: Nationwide: Town Hall on a Just and Clean Energy Future
  April 18th
• National Dark Sky Week
  April 20th
• Jon Muir Day: Sierra Club John Muir Day Study Guide
  April 21st
• Earth Day
  April 22nd
• Arbor Day: The Arbor Day Foundation
  April 24th
• Global Youth Service Day
  April 24th