PA American Water hosts water camp at Mingo Creek Park
Katie Anderson/Observer-Reporter
Children gather in a circle for an activity during a water camp Tuesday in Mingo Creek County Park.
Katie Anderson/Observer-Reporter
Don McGuirk, an educator with Allegheny Land Trust, talks with Lyoto Braun, a Canon-McMillan student, during a water camp in Mingo Creek County Park Tuesday.
Children from across Washington County got to spend this week in Mingo Creek County Park, learning about water.
Pennsylvania American Water, in partnership with Allegheny Land Trust, hosted a three-day water camp for children ages 7 to 11 at the park.
“Our water camps are a great opportunity for water education,” said Heather DuBose, spokeswoman for the water company. “It’s a big focus for our company – to provide water education for the community. We want people to know from a young age how important water is as a resource and how to protect it.”
The camp started Monday when the 30 youngsters – all children of Pennsylvania American Water customers – learned how the company brings safe, clean water to their homes. The camp includes games and crafts, creek hikes and several learning opportunities.
As part of the program, the children learn where their water comes from, how it moves through the environment, how it’s cleaned and how it can be filtered with water bottles. They also got to identify and collect macroinvertebrates in the stream and use scientific tools to measure the quality of the stream.
“They learned about different pollutants that can end up in our watershed,” DuBose said.
The students also got to design and build cardboard boats and test them on the water. Today, they’ll learn how to tie knots and cast fishing lines with the state’s Fish and Boat Commission.
Don McGuirk, also known as “Nature Don,” an educator with the Allegheny Land Trust, said they’ve been doing the camp at Mingo for the past three years.
“They’re the future,” McGuirk said about the children. “As a nonprofit, we preserve land from development, and the whole idea is to have the land here when they grow up. We want to give them knowledge on how to keep water clean, how to use it wisely and what all depends on it.”