Watershed association awards grant to continue program
By Caitlyn Kelleher

The Nashua River Watershed Association is continuing to fund the environmental education program at John R. Briggs Elementary School.

The watershed association received the $20,000 from the Massachusetts Environmental Trust to pay for the association's Environmental Education Director Mary Marro, to come into to lead student workshops throughout the year.

"It pays for her time," said Mary Gagnon, a thirdgrade teacher at Briggs. "It pays for teacher training. It pays for our planning time."

The school will also receive $200 for additional supplies for the program.

The program is running in grades one through five focusing on different curriculum standards, Gagnon said. She and fifthgrade teacher Kate Bennett have run the program from the beginning.

Briggs has received the grant for the last four years, since school officials established the Environmental as Integrating Context program.

EIC is an education reform model that uses student centered, hands-on lessons to integrate environmental education into all disciplines- history, math, science, writing, and art.

"We do life science lessons using the nature trail," Gagnon said. "We use the local history to help students (understand the country's history)."

Students also learn about vernal pools using the one behind the building as an example. Students have participated in community service projects collecting data to support several long term studies being conducted by Harvard Forest.

"We are always looking for new ways to bring the students into the c o m m u n i t y , " Gagnon said.

Briggs is one of five schools that piloted the program four years ago.

"We are considered the most successful pilot school in the state," Gagnon said.

The trust is providing over $500,000 in grants to more than 20 organizations this year, which is collected from money that state residents spend to get one of the trust's specialty license plates, according to Trust Executive Director Robbin Peach.

"Trust plates, including our signature Whale Plate, are the only specialty plates that exclusively fund environmental initiatives," Peach said. "You purchase a plate from the Registry of Motor Vehicles and half the registry fee is donated to the trust to fund water-focused environmental education and protection programs."