Planting with a Purpose: The Watershed Stewards Academy

The deluge needed to be better managed and Dawson knew how to help.

Dawson wasn’t just an interested party; he is a “Watershed Steward,” who has been educated to identify and help fix problems with stormwater runoff. Trained by Watershed Stewards Academy (WSA) based near Annapolis, Dawson and others like him find that they can take their interest in the environment to the next level by helping initiate changes that really work, and inspiring their neighbors to get involved along the way.

Every “steward has their story,” says Suzanne Kilby Etgen, Coordinator Watershed Stewards Academy, referring to the fact that people seek out or by serendipity end up working on projects they love.  A lot of the work involves “rainscaping.”  Not quite yet archived in the dictionary, “rainscaping” is quickly gaining acceptance in the world of water cleanup and pollution prevention. It refers to many things that can be done via landscaping to prevent stormwater from overrunning and polluting waterways, and in this area, ultimately the Chesapeake Bay.

Partnering with Dawson, Debra Lynn Sparby, a science teacher at Severna Park Middle School, saw an opportunity in the storm drain riser to engage her students and give them a hands-on project while helping them learn. With Dawson’s support, she was able to secure funds from the PTO and the community to install a planting in front of the storm drain that would help slow the velocity of the water, and make the water downstream cleaner and the school grounds safer.

The students loved taking part in the effort; Sparby relays how one of the students working on the project said “I’ve never pulled weeds or planted a plant in my life!”

Rusty Gowland, who grew up around waterways and is also a Watershed Steward, says that “the place to begin is where you live, with your neighbors.” He helped many in his neighborhood install rain barrels.

Gowland says sometimes the discussion on local projects starts out with a lot of debate, but “when we get to putting shovels in the ground—picture 30 people from age 6 to 70 with shovels—we get to smiling and laughing, as we are doing something simple like planting trees. We realize we just did something really important that for years will deliver value to the water. And everyone is smiling and so happy about it.”

With funding and technical support from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation (www.nfwf.org), the Chesapeake Bay Trust and Keith Campbell Foundation, WSA is developing grassroots support for cleaning the watershed. This is a model that is hoped will be emulated by other communities.

Kilby Etgen explains how momentum builds: “As you train stewards, more of the citizenry becomes engaged. You can’t put the genie back in the bottle, which has been an interesting, unexpected consequence. More folks see the need for change.  This work is so exciting; it connects passionate, highly motivated cool people.”

“We need everyone to become involved,” she adds.