Because of Tuesday’s brush with winter weather, the 16th annual Water Festival sponsored by the Shavano Conservation District had to be postponed until Thursday. However, yesterday’s sporadic drizzle didn’t deter the 250 Montrose County School District Re-1J fourth-graders from learning about one of the valley’s most prized resources — water — and the different entities that regulate and study its use.
“We feel that educating our children — that’s our future,” said organizer Cyndee Feske of the Shavano Conservation District. “We want to teach them to respect and understand (water).”
  
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“There are a lot of things we didn’t do because we weren’t taught, like turning off the water when you brush your teeth,” she said.
These students will not have the same excuse, as they learned about everything from storm drains and wastewater treatment to soils, larva and runoff.
There were to be 20 different stations for which small groups of students would travel to for a certain amount of time. However, because of the cancellation, six stations were not able to show for the rescheduled date.
The same was true for students. Feske said this was the first time in the nine years she’s been organizing the event that the rain date was used. Teachers are made aware of the rain date and asked to keep it open, but Cottonwood and Pomona students, along with two Olathe classes, were not able to make the festival due to other activities.
However, the students who attended enjoyed the hands-on ventures.
“I learned about all the different kinds of little bug and little worms-things that eat each other,” said Jared Knight, 10-year-old Johnson student. “They live in the water and serve as food for small fish.”
Knight had just finished the “Learning to Look” station, where wildlife biologist Steve Woodis had kids look at water bugs through glass, then sample the water and look at it though a microscope. The station was a favorite for several students.
Another session showed students how spring dust storms affect the snow melt. Warren Young, mineral specialist with the U.S. Forest Service in Ouray, demonstrated to students how dust absorbs the sunlight and can melt the snow up to a month faster.
A snow system observatory and research venue has been set up in Silverton to study the process and its effects. It is the only such venue in the world, he said.
New to the festival were septic haulers.
“Disposal is sensitive,” said Abby Power of Benjamin Franklin. “But we can ward off problems through education.”
In their classrooms, students have been gearing up for this event, learning about such things as runoff and the water cycle.
“We’re living on the biggest watershed in the country — we definitely need to protect it,” Knight said.
Hydrologist Dennis Murphy and Engineering Technician Jerry Thrush asked teachers to make sure the students understood some math, such as velocity and cubic feet, before the festival so they could use those concepts and apply them to real life.
Through these real-life, hands-on examples created by the Water Festival, students are able to relate the material they learn in the classroom to the professions and organizations in their community.
Contact Kati O’Hare via e-mail at katio@montrosepress.com
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