| News Release | |
| For Immediate Release: | August 21, 2008 |
| Media Contact: | Stephanie Kaleva, Project WET Foundation 406.585.4115 (direct), 406.570.9540 (cell) stephanie.kaleva@projectwet.org |
| Project WET Creates Water Education Materials for Students and Teachers in Sub-Saharan Africa | |
| “Project WET’s visionary initiative to help children gain an understanding of water and sanitation issues at an early age will go a long way in shaping future world leaders and water managers,” Honorable Maria Mutagamba, Minister of Water and Environment, Uganda | |
| Bozeman, Mont.,
21 August, 2008 – Global water problems continue to escalate and affect the quality of life for billions of people.
In many Sub-Saharan African villages, the struggle to acquire clean water saps the energy of communities, and children
are often too ill to attend school due to waterborne diseases or lack of sanitation. Although these communities are an ocean away, an
organization close to home is reaching out to them through education. In January of this year, Project WET received federal funding to create educational materials addressing critical water topics including the hydrologic cycle and health and hygiene. The project falls under the U.S. Government’s Africa Education Initiative (AEI) and contributes to the goal of increasing the number of textbooks and learning materials in Africa. By September 2008, the materials produced in French and English will be distributed to 1,000 schools in Africa through Project WET’s partner network, reaching 800,000 students. John Etgen, Senior Vice President of the Project WET Foundation and project leader said, “These materials can help empower students and their families to improve their well-being through an understanding of the relationship between water resources and health.” Addressing Sub-Saharan water issues, the project includes: a colorful poster, two student activity booklets in Project WET’s acclaimed KIDs (Kids in Discovery) series and a teachers guide. The materials were developed with input from teachers, water resource experts, academics and health educators from Sub-Saharan Africa in a writing workshop conducted in Uganda by Project WET staff. “Project WET made a commitment to develop education materials on water, sanitation, hygiene and health at a UNICEF-sponsored meeting in Oxford, England in 2006. This project fulfills this commitment and begins a partnership in Africa to educate and save lives – a process Project WET calls ActionEducation™,” said Project WET Foundation President and CEO Dennis Nelson. According to the AEI web site, “Primary school enrollments in African countries are among the lowest in the world. Education in most of Africa is adversely affected by limited funds and lack of adequate numbers of teachers, classrooms and learning materials. AEI is a multi-year initiative that focuses on increasing access to quality basic education in over 30 Sub-Saharan countries through scholarships, textbooks and teacher training programs.” Notes: - Some 6,000 children die every day from diseases associated with lack of access to safe drinking water, inadequate sanitation and poor hygiene. - About 40% of the world's 400 million school-age children are infected with intestinal worms and diarrhoea resulting from poor sanitation and hygiene, which are responsible for more than 2 million deaths per year. - About one in 10 school-age African girls do not attend school during menstruation or drop out at puberty because of the lack of clean and private sanitation facilities in schools (Source: United Nations, 2003). - 2008 is the International Year of Sanitation (http://esa.un.org/iys/). | |
 | |
| From left to right: Educators Guide, Poster and Two KIDs Activity Booklets | |
# # # | |
| About Project WET In its 24 years of operation, with a mission of reaching children, parents, educators and communities of the world with water education, Project WET has created one of the most extensive sets of original water education materials in the world, designed around hands-on investigations, demonstrations, science experiments, educational games and stories, stimulating understanding of water resources. Annually, Project WET’s global network (35 countries including 15 in Africa) conducts over 1,200 train-the-trainer workshops, reaching more than 30,000 school and community educators. The thousands of educators trained in Project WET pedagogy have reached millions of students globally with interactive lessons in sustainable water resources management. | |
|