Teachers, girl scout leaders and other youth educators have been finding new ways to bring environmental education to life with Drax Biomass.
The renewable energy company sponsored a day of activities in Pineville, Louisiana, run by Project Learning Tree, to help teachers with lesson plans and a variety of resources and fun activities to help young people learn about the environment around them and how to take care of it.
Workshop attendees participated in various games and activities including “Tree Factory” which explains the life cycle of trees, “Birds and Bugs,” which teaches children about how insects camouflage themselves and “Water Wonders,” which demonstrates how the water cycle works.
Teachers taking part in the “Birds and Bugs” activity.
Girl Scout Troop Leader Jessica Hall said:
“One of our main focuses in the Girl Scouts is getting our troops out into nature and teaching them about the environment. The workshop has given me great, practical activities that I can use with my girls as well as sharing with the 20 other troops across Bossier Parish. I can’t wait to try the ‘Birds and Bugs’ game on our upcoming hiking day where we visit a local wildlife refuge.”
Drax Biomass sponsored the workshop at the Alexandria Forestry Center in Pineville, La., including supplying 100 copies of a lesson and activity guidebook for teachers and several activity kits for use on the day that each participant got to take with them.
The activities can be done in a classroom or outdoors and can be easily adapted to suit Kindergarten through grade 8. The activities can be integrated into lesson plans for all subject areas, in particular science, math, reading, writing and social studies and can help to improve critical thinking and problem-solving abilities.
Drax Biomass Senior Vice President Matt White said:
“Project Learning Tree is a great initiative and we’re pleased to support a workshop like this one. Fostering an appreciation for our environment at a young age is so important as it encourages the next generation to play their part in conserving the natural world around us, which is essential for protecting our quality of life.”
Drax Biomass forestry colleagues L-R: James Pendarvis, Bretta Palmer, John McDowell, Steven Galloway and Kay Campbell.
Project Learning Tree – an initiative of the Sustainable Forestry Initiative – aims to promote greater awareness and knowledge of the environment through hands-on experience and engaging activities that can be integrated into the school curriculum.
Project Learning Tree Louisiana State Coordinator and employee of the USDA Forest Service, Stacy Blomquist, said:
“We’re so grateful to Drax for their support with the workshop. The day was a great success and everyone who attended said they were looking forward to incorporating the activities they’d learned into lesson plans.”
The workshop was attended by teachers and a diverse range of professionals who work with young people including members of organizations such as the Girl Scouts and 4-H which is a club dedicated to teaching children about the environment.
Drax Biomass is committed to supporting the communities local to its operations through a variety of measures that include sponsoring educational programs and providing financial support in times of crisis, including during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Pic caption: Alexandra Senior High School teachers Yasmine Russ and Veronica Guillory.
ENDS
Media contacts:
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Annmarie Sartor Drax Biomass Communications Officer T: +1 318-801-0046
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Editor’s Notes
- Project Learning Tree is an environmental education program designed for teachers and other educators, parents and community leaders working with youth from preschool through grade 12. PLT is an initiative of the Sustainable Forestry Initiative.
- Project Learning Tree uses trees and forests as windows on the world to increase students’ understanding of the environment and the actions they can take to conserve it.
- Since 1976, PLT has reached 138 million students and trained 765,000 educators to help students learn how to think about complex environmental issues.
- To find out more about Project Learning Tree training workshops and how you can attend, contact your state coordinator here.
- Drax’s support for communities in Louisiana include sponsored learning programs through the Northeast Louisiana Children’s Museum and On the Go America, alongside support for the Boys & Girls clubs of North Louisiana to help children make healthier choices.
- In the past 12 months, Drax has supported families in Northeast and Central Louisiana who were impacted by Hurricane Laura and donated $20,000 to help rebuild the public pavilion in the town of Olla and to repair the roof of Urania’s recreational hall following Hurricane Laura.
About Drax
Drax Group’s purpose is to enable a zero carbon, lower cost energy future and in 2019 announced a world-leading ambition to be carbon negative by 2030, using Bioenergy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS) technology.
Its 3,400 employees operate across three principal areas of activity – electricity generation, electricity sales to business customers and compressed wood pellet production and supply to third parties.
Power generation:
Drax owns and operates a portfolio of renewable electricity generation assets in England and Scotland. The assets include the UK’s largest power station, based at Selby, North Yorkshire, which supplies five percent of the country’s electricity needs.
Having converted Drax Power Station to use sustainable biomass instead of coal it has become the UK’s biggest renewable power generator and the largest decarbonisation project in Europe. It is also where Drax is piloting the groundbreaking negative emissions technology BECCS within its CCUS (Carbon Capture Utilisation and Storage) Incubation Area.
Its pumped storage, hydro and energy from waste assets in Scotland include Cruachan Power Station – a flexible pumped storage facility within the hollowed-out mountain Ben Cruachan.
Pellet production and supply:
Drax owns and has interests in 17 pellet mills in the US South and Western Canada which have the capacity to manufacture 4.9 million tonnes of compressed wood pellets (biomass) a year. The pellets are produced using materials sourced from sustainably managed working forests and are supplied to third party customers in Europe and Asia for the generation of renewable power.
Drax’s pellet mills supply around 30% of the biomass used at its own power station in North Yorkshire, England to generate flexible, renewable power for the UK’s homes and businesses.
Customers:
Through its two B2B energy supply brands, Haven Power and Opus Energy, Drax supplies energy to 250,000 businesses across Britain.
For more information visit www.drax.com
