About – Protect Water

About the Protect Water learning program for local drinking water source protection.

About the Active Learning Program

Welcome to Protecting Our Water: An Integrated Training and Action Learning Program for Drinking Water Source Protection

This professionally-developed learning program follows a community development model and was created for local community working groups in the Maitland Valley and Ausable Bayfield source protection areas.

Almost 100 people joined local community working groups in the source protection region in 2008, with more than 75 of those completing a 16-module training component by 2009. There were six local, multi-stakeholder, community-based working groups and a regional municipal sub-committee trained through the program.

Information here is provisional, subject to change, and posted for local information and education purposes. For current information visit Ontario.ca and sourcewaterinfo.on.ca. We would like to acknowledge the support of the Government of Ontario. Such support does not indicate endorsement of the contents of this material.

These icons accompany the drinking water source protection learning program for community working-groups.

Click on the ‘Modules’ links, at right, for excerpts of the learning program that was completed by community working groups in the Maitland Valley and Ausable Bayfield areas.

Modules

Introduction to Source Protection
Watershed Descriptions – Maitland Valley and Ausable Bayfield Source Protection Areas
Water Quality
Vulnerable Areas
Threats to Drinking Water Sources – Threat Activities and Conditions
Assessing Risks to Water Quality and Quantity – Assessment Reports
Existing Source Protection Impacts and Issues: How to Find Solutions
Existing Programs to Protect Drinking Water Sources
The Water Budget in Concept (Conceptual Water Budget)
Water Budgets for the Region – Tier 1; Tier 2; Tier 3
Review
Strategies for Action – Tools
Monitoring and Tracking Progress
Evaluation by Participants
Summary
Adopt a Vulnerable Area – Vulnerableville (Workbook)
BONUS MODULE – Also added is Module 17 – Practical ways to protect drinking water, a module suitable for secondary schools, community groups, or for review when you have completed the program.

The Look and Feel of Each Learning Module

All the modules are laid out in a similar fashion.

1) Section One of each module outlines the learning expectations as well as
learning activities to achieve those expectations.

2) Section Two is called ‘Priming the Pump’ and it provides notes, definitions and fact sheets.

3) Section Three is reserved for handouts and additional readings as well as a place where you can keep track of your field assignments and findings.

Have a look or inspect the following icons or pictures and the intended meaning for each:

Field Learning Lecture
Individual Activity Group Activity
Group Dialogue Personal Reflection
Reading Activity
Writing Activity
Did you know? (Facts)
Next Steps
Summary Help, Support and Other Resources

You will find icons appear frequently throughout your learning materials.
Following the old adage, “a picture is worth a thousand words,” the icons were designed to create clear and shared meaning at a glance for learners and facilitators, and conservation of 1,000 words.

“A picture is worth a thousand words.”

You will find the icons are frequently used throughout your online curriculum manual to help to propel you into a learning activity (e.g., time to work individually, or provide the group direction to complete an exercise with others as in the group activity icon). We hope that you will find these icons helpful in providing additional learning instruction as well as organization of the learning materials into recognizable formats (e.g., ‘Did you know?’ fact sheets, summary and conclusions or where to go for help, additional support or materials).

Protecting Our Water: An Integrated Training and Action Learning Program for Drinking Water Source Protection

Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Drinking Water Source Protection Region

Acknowledgements

Curriculum Writing Contributors and Editing Team

This adult learning program (2006-2007) was prepared for committees and working groups in the Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Drinking Water Source Protection Region under the supervision of Cathie Brown, former Project Manager, and Tim Cumming, Communications Specialist. Some modules and exercises in this program were prepared by the curriculum writing firms of Idein Rise Incorporated and Rick Hundey Planning and Management Services and Ian Hundey, Educational Consultant. Some of the work on this curriculum was prepared prior to the promulgation of the Ontario Clean Water Act, 2006 and should discrepancies exist between this document and current legislation, rules, regulations or guidance the most recent official direction takes precedence.

Some content on this website has been updated but some content may be out of date and in need of revision. Please let us know if you find errors. Visit Ontario.ca and sourcewaterinfo.on.ca for the most current information.

Reviewers

Special thanks go to the many people who reviewed drafts of this curriculum in whole or in part, including Susan Brocklebank, former Project Assistant with the Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Drinking Water Source Protection Region; Alec Scott, former Water and Planning Manager with the Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority (ABCA); Rick Steele, former Watershed Information Coordinator with the Maitland Valley Conservation Authority (MVCA); Jayne Thompson, Communications
Coordinator, MVCA; Ryan Conway, former Communications Coordinator, Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Source Protection Region; Katie Fairman, Ontario Ministry of the Environment; Kevin McKague, Water Quality Engineer, Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs
(OMAFRA); Mary Lynn MacDonald, former Group Facilitator (now Risk Management Official), Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Drinking Water Source Protection Region and Chris Van Esbroeck, former Communications Assistant, Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Drinking Water Source Protection Region.

This program curriculum is a local, living document and is likely to experience further changes as it is piloted and further reviewed.

Information here is provisional, subject to change, and provided for information and education purposes. For most current information visit sourcewaterinfo.on.ca and Ontario.ca.

Images

The Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Source Protection Region would like to thank those who supplied images for this curriculum, including Conservation Halton; Conservation Ontario; Darrell Innes, former GIS Specialist with the Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Source Protection Region; Environment and Climate Change Canada; Ontario Ministry of the Environment, Conservation and Parks; Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources and Forestry; Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs; Daniel Holm Photography and The Word & Image Studio; Government of California; On the Dot Detailed Production Management Print and Promotional Solutions; Pollution Probe; Puget Sound Action
Team (Washington State Department of Ecology in partnership with King County and cities of Bellevue, Seattle and Tacoma, Washington) and others.

If any image has not been credited properly please advise us so appropriate credits can be provided on this website or images removed if necessary.

Sources

Sources of information consulted in the development of this active learning program include:
Canadian Climate Impacts and Adaptation Research Network, Adapting to Climate Change, an Introduction for Canadian Municipalities, February 2006.
CBC News Online, ‘By the Numbers,’ August 25, 2004.
De Löe, Rob and Aaron Berg, Mainstreaming Climate Change in Drinking Water Source Protection Planning in Ontario, Pollution Probe and Canadian Water Resources Association, March 31, 2006.
de Villiers, Marq, Water: The Fate of our Most Precious Resource, McClelland and Stewart, 2003.
Environment Canada, Waterborne Pathogens in Canada, 2007.
Environmental Resources Center, University of Wisconsin Extension, Source Water Education, Source Water Curriculum Assessment Worksheet.
The Groundwater Foundation, Source Water Assessment & Protection Workshop Guide, Second Edition, 2005.
McKenzie-Mohr, Doug, Fostering Sustainable Behavior, cbsm.com, 2007.
National Water Research Institute and Environment Canada, Threats to Sources of Drinking Water and Aquatic Ecosystem Health in Canada, NWRI Scientific Assessment Report Series No. 1, 2001. Burlington, Ontario.
Ontario Ministry of the Environment, Source Protection Planning Technical
Guidance Modules, 2005-2006.
Ontario Ministry of Municipal Affairs, Planning in Action: A Hands-On Course for Municipal Planning Administrators, Student’s Manual, 1988.
Pfeiffer, J. William, The Encyclopedia of Team-Building Activities, San Diego: University Associates, 1991.
Province of Ontario, Water Budget Analysis on a Watershed Basis, Queen’s Printer for Ontario, 2000.
Soil and Water Conservation Society, Planning for Extremes, A Report from a Soil and Water Conservation Society Workshop, November 1-3, 2006.
Veliz, M., H. Brock and J. Neary, 2006. Ausable Bayfield Conservation Authority Watershed Report Card 2007. Exeter, Ontario.
The Water Quality Research Journal of Canada, Volume 138 (1), pp. 3-13, 2003.
Watershed Science Centre and Province of Ontario, Innovations in Water Management: Surface Water Quality Threat Assessment Method Using Landscape-Based Indexing, 2005.

Ausable Bayfield Maitland Valley Drinking Water Source Protection Region