Welcome to the Hunter Water Website

Case study 2

Environmental Education

 

School Water Kits

In June 2005 HWC launched a new Water Kit for schools in the Lower Hunter.

The Water Kit focuses on regional issues, and is a comprehensive education resource that incorporates curriculum based fact sheets and student work sheets.

In 2005-06 Hunter Water surveyed all schools that had accessed the School Water Kit to assess the usefulness of the kit and modify if required. Feedback from schools was very positive and comments were incorporated into the kit.

 

Sponsorship Programs

 

Waterwatch

Hunter Water has been a long standing sponsor of both Shortland Wetlands Centre and Waterwatch.
Waterwatch is a schools and community water quality education and action program in which groups:

  • are trained
  • use approved water quality monitoring kits to undertake testing and catchment investigations in their local area
  • regularly monitor catchments and enter the data into the state-wide Waterwatch website(link http://www.waterwatch.org.au/) which enables the monitoring of catchments and river health.

In addition, Waterwatch co-ordinates annual events such as P-day, Bug Surveys and Catchment Crawls that highlight various water quality issues.

 

Hunter Region Envirothon

In recent years Hunter Water has also sponsored the Hunter Region Envirothon which is a NSW Department of Education state wide environmental competition for year 11 students.

Each year the students are taken to an undisclosed location where they participate in a series of environmental activities which each have a key environmental theme.

In 2005 and 2006 the event has been held at ‘Greswick Angus’ which is a farming property located on the Williams River at Seaham. ‘Greswick Angus’ which is the subject of a best practice management project sponsored by Hunter Water and other state government authorities provided an excellent venue. The activities focused on how sustainable farming practices can contribute to managing water quality within drinking water catchments. The Managing Director of Hunter Water, Kevin Young, and the other judges were very impressed with the quality of presentations given by the students.