Program Overview
The Program – designed and implemented by experienced, certified teachers – is a three-session series for fourth, fifth and sixth graders that addresses STEM and a sampling of Common Core/NYS Education Department standards. Aidable through BOCES, the Long Island Water Education Program has consistently received enthusiastic feedback from teachers and students alike.
The program is composed of two classroom sessions and a field trip. In the one-hour hands-on class sessions students:
*Learn about our aquifer (where our drinking water comes from)
*Build mini models of the aquifer
*Experiment to see how recharge and contamination happen
*Study precipitation and runoff by simulating rain on permeable and impermeable surfaces
*Learn the role land conservation plays in protecting our ground and surface waters
At our Shore Road Sanctuary groups of students rotate through stations including:
*review of runoff concepts at stormwater outlet
*coastal ecosystem investigation with an emphasis on mutualistic relationships
*a pollination game at the pollinator garden where they learn about the benefits of and threats to bees and butterflies
*grassland habitat exploration focusing on the food chain
*poetry writing about nature
Impact of the Our Long Island Water Education Program
Since its inception in 2014, the North Shore Land Alliance Long Island Water Education Program in local schools has surpassed 15,475 students representing 37 schools from 19 school districts across Long Island.
Long Island Water Education Program News & Updates
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Long Island Water Education Program Reaches 15,000 Students
Posted on December 5, 2025Continue readingEducator Beth Finger helped celebrate a milestone in spring 2025: as of spring semester the Long Island Water Education Program had reached 15,000 students since its inception. The goal of this hands-on program, supported in part through funding from the Scotts Miracle-Gro Foundation, is for elementary school students to understand where their drinking water comes from, the values of our ground and surface water resources and how they are threatened, and how land conservation and stewardship can protect them.
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Land Alliance Long Island Water Education Program Surpasses 10,000 Students Served
Posted on June 17, 2022Continue readingAfter a pandemic year+ of postponement and a second year of remote learning (with supplies packed and delivered to schools) educator Karen Mossey finally returned to the classroom (with some interruptions!) during the 2021/2022 school year.
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Nearly 1,500 Elementary School Students Will Learn About Long Island’s Drinking Water
Posted on June 27, 2019Continue readingOn a frigid winter morning, students at Ulysses Byas Elementary School filled plastic cups with layers of sand, clay and gravel to replicate the layers of Long Island’s aquifer. This interactive activity was part of our Long Island Water Education Program.
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Long Island Water Education Program Reaches 2400 Students at 17 Local Schools
Posted on June 5, 2016Continue readingNorth Shore Land Alliance Water Education Program is Growing As of the close of the 2015/16 school year, the North Shore Land Alliance Long Island Water Education Program has, in its two short years, reached: 2,400 students at 17 local schools within nine school districts.
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Long Island Water Education Program Expands to More Local Schools
Posted on November 6, 2015Continue readingThanks to a generous $40,000 grant received from the New York State Conservation Partnership program, our Water Education Program will continue for two additional years. This fall, we expanded to include Great Neck and Valley Stream School Districts in addition to the five with which we launched the program during the 2014/15 school year.
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Grant Funding Helps Sustain Our Water Education Program and the Acquisition of the Humes Property
Posted on June 27, 2015Continue readingLand Alliance awarded a $40,000 grant in support of our acquisition of the 28-acre Humes property in the Village of Mill Neck and an additional $40,000 to help sustain our Water Education Program in elementary school throughout Long Island.
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Long Island Water Education Program is Underway!
Posted on November 13, 2014Continue readingThe North Shore Land Alliance Water Education Program reaches fourth and fifth graders at St. Patrick School in Huntington and James H. Vernon and St. Dominic Schools in Oyster Bay
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Land Alliance Launched a Water Education Program for Elementary Schools
Posted on May 6, 2014Continue readingA generous donor funds a part-time educator to implement the Long Island Water Education Program to teach students about Long Island’s groundwater, surface waters and watersheds and stewardship of this essential resource.
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Teaching a New Generation About Long Island Water
Posted on April 6, 2014Continue readingA generous donor has offered to fund a part-time educator to enter local schools to implement a three-lesson series of programs that will start in the classroom and move outdoors. Students will learn about Long Island’s groundwater, surface waters and watersheds and stewardship of this essential resource, while using interactive models, diagrams, maps and aerial photos.









