| Hogg
Middle School Serves as Exemplary Pilot School
Step
by step:
- Identify an enthusiastic,
energetic leader for the program on campus.
 In
order to sucessfully implement Team WET Schools within
a school building, a campus-based point-of-contact
is needed to serve as the liaison between the school's
faculty, staff and administration and the Team WET
Schools coordinator in the CEE national office. Lois
Richard's proved to be a very enthusiastic, energetic,
capable and dedicated first ever Team WET Schools
Campus Coordinator.
Ms.
Richards did much to integrate WET in the City and
Team WET Schools activities into the fabric of Hogg
Middle School campus life. She helped coordinate two
WET in the City educator training workshops for her
colleagues and successfully encouraged 26 teachers
from across the disciplines to participate. Then,
realizing the potential for students to repeat activities
with so many teachers utilizing the same curriculum
resource, she vertically aligned WET in the City activities
with Hogg's science and environmental science curricula
and made activity recommendations to the Chairs of
other departments. With each grade level and subject
area "assigned" certain activities, students
can experience a wide range of WET in the City water
education activities without repeating the same activity
in multiple subject areas or in multiple grades.
In
addition to aligning WET in the City activities with
Hogg's curricula, Ms. Richards greatly facilitated
effective planning and preparation  for
a culminating Team WET Schools water stewardship project
by arranging for Hogg to offer a Special Projects
class. This class provided students with time during
the school day, effective mentorship, and resources
to plan and prepare for hosting an end-of-the-year
school-wide water festival.
Students
made rainsticks and bird-houses to sell as a fundraiser
at their Team WET Schools WET in the City Water Festival..
To
further promote a water stewardship ethic among her
students, Ms. Richards often gave graded or extra
credit assignments requiring them to conserve, protect
or educate others about local water resources. For
instance, as an extension to the activity "Water
Meter," Ms. Richards gave extra credit to students
who proved, by use of their family's water bills,
that their water conservation measures actually saved
a significant amount water.
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- Celebrate a school's commitment
to water education.
A
special dedication ceremony can be used to kick-off
Team WET Schools, generating awareness and excitement
for the program within a school building and provide
visibility for the school, local partners, and the
program.
Representatives
from the City of Houston Mayor's Office, local sponsors
(see below)
and partners, the school board, CEE and Hogg Middle
School's administration, staff and student body join
together to celebrate Hogg's commitment to water education
and stewardship.
The
Hogg Middle School Team WET Schools designation ceremony
kicked off with a medley of water-related songs performed
by the school's choir. Leonel Castillo, Education
Liaison for then Houston Mayor Lee P. Brown, took
the stage and spoke of the important role Hogg students
can play in protecting Houston’s water resources.
Following his remarks, Castillo presented Deborah
Crowe, Principal at the time, and student representatives
with a certificate officially designating Hogg a “Team
WET School”...the first in Houston AND in the
nation! Representatives from CEE, the City of Houston,
and Harris County then presented Ms. Richard's with
a Team WET Schools Water Stewardship Project Resource
Kit and a special gift recognizing her role as Hogg's
Team WET Schools Campus Coordinator. The ceremony
concluded with the entrance of Clara Catfish and Edgar
Egret, mascots for the CIty of Houston/Harris County
"Clean Water Clear Choice" campaign, escorted
by students carrying a "Proud to be a Team WET
School!' banner.
After the ceremony, the celebration continued with
a mini-water festival held
in the school’s cafeteria foyer. Hogg’s
900 students had the opportunity to visit educational
displays and participate in hands-on activities during
their lunch periods. This mini-festival served as
a small glimpse of possible things to come as the
students, teachers, staff & administration embarked
on a mission to plan and host a school-wide water
festival in the spring of 2003.
Students
test "green" alternative cleaners as part
of "A Recipe For Clean Water" during a mini-water
festival held immediately after Hogg's Team WET Schools
designation ceremony.
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- Train
teachers to implement WET in the City activities in
the classroom.
In
order for students to make informed decisions about
the stewardship of water resources they need to have
a knowledge and understanding of water and water related
issues. Activities from the WET
in the City Curriculum and Activity Guide can
provide just such a foundation. Research has shown
that educators who receive training to effectively
utilize  a
curriculum resource are more likely to incorporate
more activities from it into their classrooms than
those who do not.
Hogg
teachers map Somewhere Creek, a hypothetical urban
waterway featured in "Urban Waterway Checkup,"
an activity presented during a WET in the City workshop
held at the school.
To
help Hogg teachers provide their students with a broad
base of general water knowledge and an understanding
of local water issues, CEE staff and professionals
from the City of Houston Water Conservation Program
teamed up to present two WET in the City educator
training workshops. Twenty-two teachers from  Hogg's
science, math, history, language arts, art, music,
physical education and special education departments
participated in the workshops. Many teachers have
since reported engaging eager classes of students
in a variety of WET in the City activities. Some activities
were so well received that they were adapted and presented
by students at booths during Hogg's Team WET Schools
WET in the City Water Festival (see
below).
Students
in Ms. Hankins' Environmental Science class map Somewhere
Creek and learn about the impacts that humans can
have on urban waterways.
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- Provide
advanced training to facilitate a successful water
stewardship project.
Realizing that mentoring successful student-driven
environmental projects often takes different skills
and understanding of logistics beyond simply presenting
activities in the classroom, CEE committed to providing
Team WET Schools with an advanced training workshop
appropriate to the intended project. These advanced
training workshops are presented by CEE staff or are
arranged through partnerships with other local groups
with expertise in mentoring different types of student
projects.
From
the very start, teachers and students at Hogg Middle
School were interested in hosting a school-wide water
festival to develop and strengthen ties with the local
community and provide visibility for the school. Knowing
this, CEE staff developed and presented a three-hour
"How to Organize and Host a School Water Festival"
workshop. Thirteen teachers from across the disciplines
participated and became the core of a school-based
festival planning and mentorship team.  In
addition to providing their own students with guidance
as they prepared for individual classroom or department-sponsored
booths, a number of teachers from this workshop volunteered
to serve as mentors during after school hours and/or
during Hogg's Special Projects class.
Teachers
determine "Is There Water On Zork?" during
the festival try-its portion of a "How to Organize
and Host a School Water Festival" workshop held
at Hogg.
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- Recognize a school's completed
water stewardship project and other water education
and stewardship accomplishments.
Student
water stewardship projects often represent very tangible
and visible evidence of student learning about water
and water-related issues. Because of this, CEE has
made a commitment to be present at events commemorating
the completion of Team WET Schools' water stewardship
projects including: student-led water festivals; public
presentations of water quality monitoring results;
ribbon-cutting ceremonies on new water-wise outdoor
classrooms; and much more. CEE provides national recognition
for each Team WET School's water stewardship efforts
through photographs and articles in WET
Works (national program newsletter) and on the
Team WET Schools web site. CEE also works with individual
Team WET Schools and local sponsors and partners to
get the word out about student projects to the local
media.
On April 12,
2003 Hogg Middle School hosted their first annual
Team WET Schools WET in the City water festival. Using
what they learned by participating in WET in the City
and other water education activities in their classrooms,
Hogg Middle School  students
served as water experts and led over 30 interactive,
hands-on educational booths that engaged and informed
over 650 parents, students, younger children from
feeder elementary schools, and members of the community.
Special
Education students became groundwater experts and
presented "Aquifer in a Cup."
From
a "Long Haul" relay race to a "Recipe
For Clean Water" experiment, and from a "Water
Meter" make-and-take craft to an "Urban
Waterway Checkup" critter-habitat match game,
many adapted WET in the City activities made their
debut at Hogg's water festival.
Hogg
also used the venue of their festival to help raise
funds to support a number of school programs. The
Student Council sold snow cones. The Hogg Café
sold lunch. The  Science
department sold crafts including rainsticks, birdhouses,
hummingbird feeders and butterfly sculptures that
they made using earth-friendly materials such as recycled
cardboard tubes and boxes, brown paper bags and empty
water bottles.
Girls
display the rainsticks they made to help raise funds
for Hogg's science department.
Celebrating the versatile talents of Hogg students,
the day was accompanied with music thanks to Hogg’s
sound engineering class. Seventh grade language arts
students emerged as budding actors with the performance
of a play, “Freddie the Fish,” in the
school auditorium.
Hundreds of volunteers and guests went home acknowledging
a job well done and ready to practice water wise ways.
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