Starting A Monthly Adult Environmental Education News Column for A Local Southwestern Wisconsin Newspaper

Abstract

The goal of this project was to develop an adult environmental information monthly news column for the local Wisconsin paper, the Reedsburg Independent. It is hoped that Reedsburg area residents, with the help of the news media, could increase their understanding of environmental issues local to their Sauk County home and would also take part in remediating issues that were most pertinent to them. A secondary goal of this undertaking was to formulate a working list of Sauk County environmental leaders and educators who could provide advice and insight on topics covered in each of the news articles. Through a mailed questionnaire to Sauk County environmental leaders, county issues were assessed to help focus the monthly news articles onto topics which were most relevant to the local area. The final product of this project is the newspaper column "Earth Friendly Living" which is published once a month in the Reedsburg Independent. Each column contains an article describing a local environmental issue and actions readers might take locally to help remedy those issues.