General Motors Company workers from two Lansing, Mich., plants are helping school children understand what they can do to help keep local groundwater safe and clean as part of the 15th annual Children’s Water Festival today at Michigan State University.
More than 2,000 fourth, fifth and sixth graders from school districts in Michigan’s Ingham, Eaton and Clinton counties, are participating in the event .
The GM team members from Lansing Grand River and Lansing Delta Township factories will provide hands-on lessons showing students how over fertilizing their law or dumping soapy water from car washing into storm sewers can hurt the ecosystems that exist in local streams and lakes.
“We have made a mock map of an area of a city with a watershed out of a shower curtain and we’re going to have the kids spread different substances on the curtain and let them see how they ‘flow’ into the watershed,” said Jim Ecklund, senior environmental engineer at Lansing Grand River, where the Cadillac CTS and CTS-V are assembled..
In one exercise, students will spread salt onto the roads outlined on the map – mimicking what some cities use to clear roads in the winter. Students will then spray water on the curtain to mimic rain and see how the salt flows into the mock stream and lake at the center of the curtain.
Similar exercises will be done to show the impacts of dumping oil on streets and over-fertilizing vegetation.
“The goal here is to show the kids that it only takes simple steps to make a difference, like dumping the soapy water left over from car washing into their home sink, where the water is treated in a treatment plant, as opposed to into the storm sewer, which flows directly into the local creek,” Ecklund said.
The Lansing activities are a small part of the contribution GM employees around the world make to improving their local environment. In the U.S., GM has joined forces with Earth Force, a non-profit organization dedicated to creating a generation of young people who are environmental citizens, to form GM GREEN. The GREEN program brings together GM team members, students and teachers across the country to build rain gardens to filter storm water, organize river clean-ups and lead outreach campaigns to educate their communities about local water quality issues. The goal, like that of the Children’s Water Festival, is to empower young people to be environmental change agents in their communities.
“Young people are the decision makers of tomorrow. So why not help them build those skills today?” asked Teri Kline, GM senior environmental engineer and coordinator of the GM GREEN program. “The GREEN program and those like it work to engage the entire community in fostering environmental citizenship in our young people.”
More than 100,000 students have been educated through GM GREEN and programs like it throughout more than 32 communities in the past 20 years.
