Water Campaign Friendships

Two years ago, Aquatic Society of Omaha from Nebraska and St. Roza from Uganda joined our 2017 Water Campaign. These two teams met each other through the Campaign as partner teams and learned about methods to improve water quality and water conservation efforts. During the Campaign, the two teams communicated a common interest in water conservation, food security, and improving sustainable agricultural efforts. Since first meeting each other, Aquatic Society of Omaha and St. Roza have collaborated on several environmentally focused projects and have kept in contact in future Campaigns. We’re happy to see our Campaign teams get along so well!

Continued Collaboration

These veteran Grades of Green Campaign teams have continued to participate in environmental efforts together- most recently in the Pollination Project. Aquatic Society of Omaha and St. Roza are committed to learning about modern agricultural practices in order to improve agricultural efforts, learn about water dynamics in soil, and improve sustainable resource usage. Both Aquatic Society of Omaha and St. Roza are working to improve awareness and solutions for water issues by researching the impact of water scarcity and by working on food growing units. By improving food growing aspects in incremental steps, the teams are improving water and quality by incorporating water testing and soil testing kits into food growing units while taking action on other agricultural measure. Other innovations include adding nets to the bottom of food growing units to prevent pests from attacking food roots and adding enriched soils to these kits.

Join the Water Campaign!

Want to join teams like Aquatic Society of Omaha and St. Roza in fighting water issues around the world? Feel free to join us in our next Water Campaign here!

Who knows? Maybe you’ll find a great partner team to collaborate too!

Is It That Big of a Problem?

Grades of Green students have been making efforts to reduce waste in their communities during this year’s Waste Campaign. Students are cleaning up litter, reducing their plastic emissions, and diverting food waste. But what’s the big deal with waste?

Waste Affects Us All!

Pollution from single-use plastics, micro-plastics, landfill dumped food, and litter all go in our environment. This pollution can have harmful and unintended side-effects on a variety of things. Animals can choke on larger plastic pieces. Microplastics can be found in many fish and in sea salts used to season food in virtually every ocean. Landfill dumped food can leak nitrogen and phosphates into nearby water ways- damaging wildlife and creating oxygen depriving algae blooms.

In addition, the emissions created by creating many of these unnecessary materials can harm the world as well. Increased carbon emissions are reducing the nutritiousness of rice around the world, a staple crop that feeds much of the world’s developing populations.

What Can We Do?

Grades of Green’s students have been brave enough to start by addressing waste issues within their communities. By reducing plastic usage, cleaning up litter, and diverting food waste towards composting bins, students are not only helping themselves, but helping their communities learn about easy ways to reduce the harmful habits that ultimately harm us. In addition to taking direct action, students have also contacted their legislators to bring this to the attention of decision makers!

Know a brave student who can make a difference too? Have them join us in our next Campaign!