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EPA awards $21,285 to Minnesota organizations for environmental education projects

Release Date: 07/21/2006
Contact Information: Megan Gavin, (312) 353-5282, [email protected]

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
No. 06-OPA128

CHICAGO (July 21, 2006) - U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Region 5 recently awarded environmental education grants to two Minnesota organizations. Eco Education, St. Paul, received $15,000, and The Patricia L. and Wendell W. Maltby Foundation, Randolph, received $6,285.

The Minnesota groups are among 10 organizations in EPA's six-state Region 5 that received a total of $187,200 in environmental education grant money this year. More than 100 proposals were received from groups in Illinois Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin.

"These creative projects inspire environmental stewardship in communities throughout the Midwest," said Region 5 Acting Administrator Bharat Mathur. "We recognize the winners' imaginative approaches to environmental education."

The Eco Education project will focus on teachers and build their knowledge of current urban environmental issues. Teachers will in turn instruct students, through service-learning, issue investigation, relationship building
and youth leadership to become active participants in current environmental issues facing their communities and the state of Minnesota.

The Maltby Foundation project will encourage 7th and 8th grade students to connect with the Cannon River near Minneapolis as they investigate water quality, explore watershed concepts and recognize how their daily actions and choices affect water quality. Students will make repeated trips to the river to collect and analyze water information.

EPA grants are awarded yearly under the National Environmental Education Act, which was passed in 1990 to stimulate environmental education through design, demonstration and communications projects conceived by local organizations.

For more information on Region 5's environmental education program go to http://epa.gov/region5/enved/.