Southeast Region Restoration & Education

The N.C. Coastal Federation works with numerous partners to link coastal habitat restoration with environmental education in the Southeast Region. The federation’s education program engages students and adults in projects to protect water quality and restore important coastal habitats. Our program strives to provide opportunities for individuals to take an active role in the stewardship of our coastal waters and habitats. Learn More.

Current Projects

Students learn about oysters, then improve habitat

The federation is working with Ashley, Dixon and John T. Hoggard high schools in our Oyster Habitat Program in the Southeast Region.

Eugene Ashley High School: Students at Ashley, a public school in Wilmington, ave been engaged in oyster restoration for two years. Over 80 students have participated in classroom lessons and oyster dissections. A number of students also worked with their former teacher, Bryan Bishop, to recycle oyster shells from restaurants in Carolina Beach. They also went to Washington to talk to their congressional representatives about the importance of oysters in our estuarine systems.

John T. Hoggard High School: Students have been engaged in oyster restoration for two years. Over 100 students at Hoggard, a public school in Wilmington, have participated in classroom lessons and oyster dissections. A number of students also worked with the federation to monitor the Dick’s Bay oyster restoration project and plant the shoreline and rain garden at Morris Landing.

Dixon High School: Dixon High School is a public school near Holly Ridge in Onslow County. Myron Beatty became personally involved with the federation by volunteering for restoration activities and he decided to involve his students, as well. Dixon students volunteer after school hours to help with shoreline and oyster reef monitoring activities. Students helped monitor the federation’s oyster reef in nearby Stump Sound and a living shoreline site at Morris Landing in Holly Ridge. Dixon students monitored water quality, created footprints of both sites and took detailed data of any living plants or animals found. Students have also helped with clean-ups at Morris Landing on numerous occasions.

Rain Gardens in the Schools

Rain gardens are simple and effective methods for preventing polluted stormwater runoff and coastal flooding. Rain garden projects are suitable for elementary and middle school students and offer lesson plans, resources and activities that lead students and teachers through the process of planning, designing, building, planting and maintaining a rain garden on school grounds.

Alderman Elementary School

The federation worked with Edwin A. Alderman Elementary School in Wilmington to build a large rain garden or bioretention area at the school. With support from Wal-Mart, the New Hanover Soil and Water Conservation District, and New Hanover County Schools NCCF worked with students, teachers and community members to install over 400 plants in the bioretention area. The project contractor, Coastal Carolina Resource Group, worked with the federation to design, excavate and grade the large and complex project.

Bradley Creek School

The federation is teaming up with the New Hanover Soil and Water Conservation District and New Hanover County Schools to create a site plan and install stormwater reduction projects and low-impact development practices at Bradley Creek Elementary School in Wilmington. The 15-acre schoolyard is in the headwaters of Hewletts Creek. The goal of this multi-year project is to install a series of rain gardens, bioretention areas, stormwater wetlands and cisterns to capture and treat all the stormwater from the site generated by a 1.5-inch of rainfall. The project will start with a couple of student and community plantings. Please see our Regional Calendar for information on the events.

Student Wetland Nurseries

Two schools, Roland Grise Middle School and Friends School of Wilmington, worked with the federation in the classroom this winter and are conducting seed germination experiments with salt marsh cordgrass (spartina alterniflora) seeds they collected in the fall. The students are also preparing their school yard nurseries for the 1,500 seedlings they will be receiving later this Spring as part of the federation’s Student Wetland Nursery Program.

^ Top

• Southeast Region:

• Advocacy
• Low-Impact Development
• Preservation
• Restoration/Education