The Wrack

Laudholm Trust has received an Employee Vibrant Community Grant from Corning Incorporated Foundation. The grant will enhance “Watershed Stewardship in Action: Deaf Students on the Estuary.”

Terms like "watershed" and "estuary" are part of our daily lexicon, but have had no equivalents in American Sign Language. To encourage STEM learning in New England’s deaf community, we and our partners are introducing new terms and teaching tools.

Teachers on the Estuary program continues its impact with fifteen educators in attendance this year.

We are putting teachers on the estuary again this summer by offering a free workshop that will give educators data-driven climate change activities to bring back to their classes. The workshop will train up to ten educators in reserve-style environmental monitoring, "coastal blue carbon" concepts, and ways to understand and address climate change.

Teachers on the Estuary Returns in 2016

The four New England research reserves are putting teachers on the estuary again this summer by offering free workshops that will give educators data-driven climate change activities to bring back to their classes. Each of the four TOTE (Teachers on the Estuary) workshops, one 3- or 4-day session per reserve, will train a dozen educators in reserve-style environmental monitoring, "coastal blue carbon" concepts, and ways to understand and address climate change.

Please note: The workshop at Wells Reserve will be held Monday, July 11 through Thursday, July 14, 2016. Review of applications will begin May 31, 2016.

Wells Reserve TOTE Application

Wells Reserve TOTE Draft Agenda

Wells Reserve TOTE Promotional Flyer

To learn more about TOTE workshops, see the articles at wellsreserve.org/tote.

Why TOTE?

Teachers often don't get much exposure to estuarine and watershed concepts during their own education, so it can be daunting for them to develop a curriculum (and locate suitable data sets) around these topics. TOTE workshops show teachers how to access and employ custom curricula and data that already meet Next Generation Science Standards or state education frameworks.

"We have the opportunity to re-invent the world." That was a final thought from one participant at the end of last week's Teachers on the Estuary (TOTE) workshop here at the Reserve. After four busy days of guest speakers, hands-on activities, and visits to field research sites, the eight middle and high school educators hailing from states along the east coast from Maine to Florida shared their ideas for i…

Year 4 of the popular teacher training program.

Nearly four months after their Teachers on the Estuary (TOTE) II summer workshop at the Wells Reserve, eight middle and high school teachers from New England reunited for an exciting day of professional development and comradery. In the morning, the group reconvened at Waquoit Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve in Falmouth, MA, where they reported on their student-driven stewardship project progress. This team of TOTE II teachers is a truly inspirational bunch. They are fostering a sense of stewardship in their students while getting outside and teaching with a systems-based approach. Their students are becoming agents of change within their watersheds and local communities.

Last week, the Reserve hosted twelve middle and high school teachers from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, and Louisiana for Teachers on the Estuary (TOTE) II, a field-based workshop focused on estuary and watershed education. This is the third TOTE workshop held at the Reserve, but unlike the first two, this year's TOTE was only open to teachers who had already participated in a New England TOTE workshop at either the Wells National Estuarine Research Reserve (NERR), the Waquoit Bay NERR in Massachusetts, or the Narragansett Bay NERR in Rhode Island.

David Word is an 11th and 12th grade AP biology and environmental science teacher at St. Francis High School in Louisville, Kentucky. Thanks to his participation in Teachers on the Estuary last summer he has been very busy with his students this year, removing invasive species within a 200 square foot area of riparian forest along the Beargrass Creek. Species of invasives within the plot included Bush Honeysuckle, English Ivy, and Winter Creeper.

After the removal, the group planted 70 native plants within the same area. Native species planted include: Great Blue Lobelia, Joe Pye Weed, Mistflower, Thimbleweed, Slender Mountain Mint, Wild Geranium, and Jack in the Pulpit.