Trinity L.A.N.D.S. Program

Learning Across New Dimensions in Science

 

The  L.A.N.D.S Youth Stewardship Initiative was developed by the Texas Wildlife Association to deliver an interactive message of wildlife and natural resource conservation to Texas classrooms.  The Texas Wildlife Association , Trinity Basin Conservation Foundation, Texas Parks and Wildlife  and  Texas AgriLife Extension Service have teamed up to develop a program designed specifically for students who live along the Trinity River Basin to promote sound land stewardship to improve the water quality and general health of the Trinity River and its’ watershed.


Trinity Pilot Project

Two schools (St. John’s Episcopal School in Dallas, and Blooming Grove Elementary, in a rural community downriver) are currently enrolled in the Trinity LANDS program.  Their semester in the program includes the following components and activities:


  • Teachers utilize Trinity LANDS curriculum in their classroom to teach the basics of water quality and the components of healthy aquatic ecosystems.
  • Students travel to a location in the Trinity River Basin in their community to sample water quality and riparian parameters
  • Analysis, lab experiments and more in-class curriculum
  • Students have a second field trip in which they travel to their ‘sister-school’s’ data collection point: illustrating the change in water quality depending on environment and outside factors such as land use
  • Distance learning technology is utilized to connect the two classrooms for data comparison and interactive activities facilitated from the TWA headquarters
  • Students from both schools meet at the TPW Freshwater Fisheries center in Athens to network and share data

Program Deliverables

  • Equip students and parents with the knowledge, connection to nature and ability to articulate their values relating to water quality and land stewardship
  • Provide students with a renewed sense of appreciation and responsibility for the natural world around them
  • Provide students with an understanding of the impacts land uses have on water quality and watershed health
  • Nurture ambassadors for conservation and land stewardship
  • Inspire activism that will spread through families, communities, the Trinity Basin, and ultimately result in a significant change in attitude toward the value of private land stewards  and stewardship in the larger water equation