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Lights, Camera, Action: EPA Grant Supports the Arts and Environment in Camden

Release Date: 11/14/2008
Contact Information: Terry Ippolito (212) 637-3671, [email protected]

(New York, N.Y.) How can students use sculpture, dance, drama, water colors or photography to improve air quality or water pollution? Teens at Camden Creative Arts High School will explore the environment/arts relationship by participating in New Jersey Audubon Society’s Audubon on Call - Environmental Expression through the Arts. The program, supported by a grant from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), combines environmental classroom sessions and field experiences focusing on environmental health, water quality and environmental stewardship.

“This project empowers Camden teens to explore and improve their environment and share what they learn with their community.” said EPA Regional Administrator Alan J. Steinberg. “The knowledge and skills they acquire and the creative environmental protection messages their art work conveys can make a difference in the air, water and land in Camden. EPA is delighted to make this environmental education experience possible.”

The New Jersey Audubon Society (NJAS) received a $30,000 EPA grant for the project which is designed to prevent pollution, teach community members how humans impact their environment and help citizens mitigate those impacts through effective pollution prevention actions.

NJAS will work with a team of teachers at Camden Creative Arts High School to correlate environmental studies with the high school curriculum. Teachers and NJAS staff will determine how to provide study units to increase students’ environmental knowledge and skills. The schedule will include classroom presentations and field trips using Camden parkland and Audubon nature preserves to give students real world environmental watershed protection and habitat restoration experiences. Students will be working with professionals in environmental sciences and the arts, giving them career exploration opportunities in addition to meaningful hands-on studies.

Students will incorporate the concepts covered in the classroom and field experiences into arts projects conveying environmental messages to the community. Their projects will be shared at a culminating event bringing the program participants together with family, peers and Camden residents.

Additional information about pollution prevention can be found at https://www.epa.gov/p2/ . More information about the programming at Camden Creative Arts High School is at http://www.creativeartshs.org/mission_and_goal.jsp . The New Jersey Audubon Society’s web site is http://www.njaudubon.org/ .

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