Local Focus
Organizations
New York and Vermont Local Watershed Groups
Check with your local watershed group for partnership and service learning opportunities. >>Go
Lake Champlain Maritime Museum
Be sure to check out their comprehensive bookstore on line! Navigating the Champlain Valley 1609: Quadricentennial Curriculum, Lake Champlain Maritime Museum, K-12 on- line curriculum resource tied to NY standards and VT. >>Go
Lake Champlain Underwater Historic Preserve
The States of Vermont and New York have established the Lake Champlain Underwater Historic Preserve to provide public access for divers to some of the Lake's historic shipwrecks. >>Go
Champlain Valley National Heritage Partnership Program
The Champlain Valley is one of 49 sites in the U.S.designated as a national heritage area. See the resource links to cultural heritage and recreations sites of importance including locations to local trails with interpretive information. >>Go
Vermont Folklife Center
The VFC encourages the sharing of cultural heritage through oral histories. Check out their teacher and children’s resources. >>Go
The Vermont Reptile and Amphibian Atlas
The Vermont Reptile and Amphibian Atlas Project collects and disseminates data needed to make informed recommendations regarding the state status, state rank, and conservation of Vermont’s reptiles and amphibians. WEC participant Sandra Fary and her students made several contributions to the atlas from Camel’s Hump Middle School. >>Go
Perkins Geology Museum
The Perkins Geology Museum at the University of Vermont is dedicated to helping students understand geologic concepts and processes, is open for free group tours, and is home to Vermont’s fossil, Charlotte, the beluga whale. >>Go
VT EPSCoR (Experimental Program to Stimulate Competitive Research)
VT EPSCoR runs the Streams Project which is dedicated to student and teacher stream data collection and sharing within the Lake Champlain basin and beyond. >>Go
Center for Northern Woodlands Education
The Center for Northern Woodlands Education works to advance a culture of forest stewardship in the Northeast and to increase appreciation for the natural wonders, economic productivity and ecological integrity of the region’s forests. The Northern Woodlands Goes to School program provides educators with many forest education resources. >>Go
Champlain, Hudson, Fulton.
New York State Education Department, K-12 On-line Curriculum guide with modules and scholarly views, linked to NYS standards. >>Go
Lake Champlain Community Sailing Center
The Center works with local schools to teach students the importance of lake stewardship and ecology through hands on environmental education lessons reinforced by on-water recreation activities. >>Go
Historic Lakes Website
As described by its author, this website is a labor of love by a resident writer who has collected a variety of sources and information about these northern lakes. >>Go
Local History Sites which also offer curriculum materials for Lake Champlain
Fort Ticonderoga
Mt Independence
Fort Crown Point
Lake Champlain Maritime Museum
WatershED Matters and CBEI Partners with curriculum materials and programs based on the Lake Champlain Basin.
Lake Champlain Basin Program
ECHO Lake Aquarium and Science Center
Shelburne Farms
Vermont Agency of Natural Resources
UVM Watershed Alliance
Lake Champlain Committee
Exemplary Programs
Trans-border educational program in southern Quebec
This blogspot contains the work of Isabelle Gregoire, naturalist and WEC alum. It contains lovely images and student work. >>Go
Clear Water Musketeers
Corporation Bassin Versant Baie Missisquoi, K-8, four-part printed program and activities for studying the Quebec portion of the Lake Champlain Missisquoi watershed.
Satellites, Weather and Climate
This site contains high school curriculum units about weather created by Vermont educators. >>Go
Issues
The Lake Champlain Basin Atlas contains more than 40 full-color maps about the Lake Champlain Basin, articles about the maps, photographs, and a glossary. >>Go
State of the Lake Report – Lake Champlain Basin Program staff and partners compile this report to answer frequently asked questions about the lake and to track progress on lake conditions. >>Go
Water Quality/Clean Water-Lake Champlain Basin
Since 1991, the LCBP has been collecting water quality samples on lake Champlain in partnership with the states of New York and Vermont. The long term monitoring data is posted on the VT Agency of Natural Resources website, listing data from both VT and NY monitoring locations. >>Go to website
Lake Champlain Basin Program Fact Sheets
The LCBP Fact Sheet series explains some of the most pressing water quality and natural resources issues in the Lake Champlain watershed. >>Go to website
Blue Green Algae (Cyanobacteria) – The LCBP partners with the University of Vermont and the Lake Champlain Committee to monitor blue green algae throughout Lake Champlain. In Quebec, additional samples are collected for Missisquoi Bay which historically has experienced significant blooms in consecutive years. Website postings for blooms appear on the Vermont Public Health Department’s webpage. Blue green algae blooms have become fairly common in North America and beyond in the past decade. >>Go to VT Public Health Dept website
Climate Change
Climate Change in the Lake Champlain Basin – A ground-breaking report commissioned by the Vermont and Adirondacks chapters of The Nature Conservancy brings global climate change down to the local scale in the Lake Champlain Basin and takes a pragmatic approach to lessening the impact. >>Go to report
Barlow, Virginia and Stephen Long. “Rediscovering a Long-Gone Forest: An Interview with Charlie Cogbill.” Northern Woodlands. Mar 1, 2007.
This article presents an informative interview with Charlie Cogbill, a plant ecologist, about his work researching changes in northern forest composition through archives and landsurveys from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. This historical record may serve as a useful tool to anticipate and understand how forest composition changes with human impacts, and specifically changes in climate. >>Go to article
Stager, Curt and Mary Thill. Climate Change in the Champlain Basin: What Natural Resource Managers Can Expect and Do. The Nature Conservancy (2010).
A comprehensive presentation of temperature, precipitation, ice over and other climate trends in the Champlain Basin as compared to global trends with a particular focus observed and projected impacts on lake and tributary ecology. Though directed toward resource managers this is also an excellent resource for teachers. >>Go to report
Vermont Agency of Natural Resources: Climate Change Team –This is the state’s homepage for climate change. It includes descriptions and links to current Vermont initiatives, a presentation of VT’s historical, current, and projected emissions, a succinct explanation of the science of climate change, updates on current news and events, and suggested actions steps appropriate for individuals, communities and schools. >>Go to website
Vermont Climate Change Oversight Committee Final Report (2010) .Climate_Change_Oversight_Committee_Final.Report.pdf Vermont’s legislative report on recommended initiatives and steps the state should consider with regard to climate change. This is definitely not student-friendly, but provides insight into how the state might approach our changing climate. >>Go to report
* See the Global resources section for more climate change resources
In the News
ECHO gives spiny shoftshell turtles a 'head start'
As our families grow, we often find the need for more space. If we have time and money, we might build an addition to our home, or choose to find a larger one altogether. Generally we have choices about where to settle and raise our children. Not so for the eastern spiny softshell turtle (Apalone spinifera). >>More
Although charming, country roads contribute to Vermont's water pollution problems
Our love-hate relationship with dirt and gravel roads must now more fully embrace phosphorus, the mineral nutrient most closely associated with algae overgrowth in Lake Champlain, researchers say. >>More
Dam to be removed from famed Manchester trout stream
A famous Vermont trout stream is expected to see improvements after a dam is removed, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife said Tuesday. >>More