Outreach

The Arbor Lake Watershed Project was developed by Imagine Grinnell and is administered by the Poweshiek Soil & Water Conservation District. The objectives of the project are to implement Best Management Practices that reduce the amount of sediment and nutrients entering the lake and to initiate an information and education program within the community to both the urban and rural areas. Click here to read more about the project on the City of Grinnell website and to view a map of the area and photos.

The Grinnell Park Mapping Project, initiated in May 2004, involves creating detailed maps of our parks’ natural resources, physical features, buildings, and recreational equipment and involving city staff, college students, high school students, and volunteers in the mapping process and spatial analyses.

The Grinnell Youth Conservation Corps is a program that employs Grinnell high school students for 8 weeks in the summer to work on conservation projects in Grinnell Parks. A Grinnell College student serves as the program coordinator through a summer internship. The program is a collaborative endeavor by the Center for Prairie Studies, Grinnell College Career Development office, City of Grinnell, and Imagine Grinnell.

Local Food System. (GALFA) Established in 2001, the Grinnell Area Local Food Alliance is a partnership among several private non-profit organizations and government agencies in and around Grinnell dedicated to drawing the public’s attention to the virtues of eating locally produced food and assisting in the further development of a local food system.

Grinnell Dining Service's local foods effort appears in the "Food Service Director Magazine." Courtesy of Food Service Director Magazine

Poweshiek County Pioneer Cemeteries. The Center for Prairie Studies has worked with the Poweshiek County Pioneer Cemetery Commission in planning prairie restoration and maintenance at a pioneer cemetery near Victor.

• Pioneer cemeteries are some of the best places to look for prairie remnants, prairies that have never been plowed. A pioneer cemetery is a cemetery that has had fewer than 6 burials in the last 50 years.
  
  
• Center staff, Girl Scouts, Boy Scouts, students with the Grinnell College Environmental Action Group, members of the Poweshiek County Pioneer Cemetery Commission, and Township trustees are all working together to restore prairie to the Old Victor Pioneer Cemetery in Poweshiek County.