Yuba Water Agency has introduced a new science curriculum that uses California’s Yuba River watershed to teach students about flooding, water systems, water chemistry and other environmental and engineering-related topics.
The Yuba River Watershed Curriculum, funded by the agency and developed by teachers in Yuba County, California, includes hundreds of science-based lessons for students from kindergarten through high school. The units have been designed to meet the US Next Generation Science Standards.
Among the subjects covered are the major floods that affected Yuba County in 1986 and 1997, human impacts on water systems, the chemistry of local water sources, hydraulic mining, erosion and flooding.
Yuba Water Agency owns and operates the 361MW Yuba River Development Project, a multipurpose water infrastructure scheme that provides flood risk reduction, water supply and hydropower generation in northern California.
“It’s incredible to see this come together after years of hard work by our teachers, and to be able to give this gift to the community,” said Yuba Water General Manager Willie Whittlesey. “Given the financial impacts of our penstock incident that took much of our hydropower generation offline earlier this year, we’re having to cut back on non-mission critical expenses. But, this program was funded before the crisis, so, it’s especially meaningful to be able to give this gift to the community right now.”
The curriculum project was coordinated and funded by Yuba Water, with oversight from an advisory group comprising superintendents from all five Yuba County school districts, the Yuba County Office of Education, Yuba Community College District, South Yuba River Citizens League and the Yuba River Endowment.
Between 2020 and 2022, the agency contracted local teachers to develop the material. Following training in developing lessons aligned with the Next Generation Science Standards, teachers worked in grade-level groups to create units based on issues affecting the local watershed.
The lessons were subsequently refined and piloted in classrooms over a further two years. Yuba Water then commissioned education consultancy Arroyo Research Services to independently review the curriculum and assess its compliance with the science standards.
“We owe these teachers a huge debt of gratitude for the incredible work they’ve done,” said DeDe Cordell, Yuba Water’s communications manager, who served as the project manager. “One of my favorite things about this project is that year after year, the curriculum will build on itself, so that by the time these kids graduate from high school, they will not only have a really solid science education, but also, a deep appreciation of the Yuba River and the benefits that our natural resources bring to this community.”
The curriculum is available free of charge for teachers to use in their classrooms.
