The Rainshadow Effect: Water Issues—Local to Global

Project Sponsor: Rainshadow Community Charter High School
Grant amount: $10,000
Organization match: $6,418.85
Funding Date: June 2007
Project Status: Complete

Summary: Twenty-five students in a two-semester high school course learned about interdisciplinary inquiry into local and global water issues, river cleanup, artistic documentation of the Truckee River, and a “multiplier” educational effect extending to the full Rainshadow student body and to the Truckee Meadows community through presentations, community forums, art and science displays, and participation in community cleanup and Earth Day projects. Students developed individual and group research projects on water issues, took specific responsibility for riverbank cleanup in the downtown area, made public presentations and forums on their research, participated in and led community efforts to promote awareness of water issues and problems, and offered specific solutions to local issues and problems, linking the kinds of issues we experience in Nevada to global issues of water availability, purity, supply and demand, distribution, and finances.