EAST ALTON – Each year, volunteers across Illinois contribute to monitoring water quality through Illinois RiverWatch. Training will be held in April and May, providing community members with the skills to collect data and assess the health of local streams.
RiverWatch, a community science program, is coordinated by the National Great Rivers Research and Education Center (NGRREC?) at Lewis and Clark Community College.
Each spring, RiverWatch offers workshops where volunteers learn to collect and identify stream macroinvertebrates (water bugs) and describe the physical condition of the stream habitat.
“Macroinvertebrates is just a fancy word for water bugs,” Riverwatch Volunteer Coordinator Hannah Griffis said. “Many people do not pay attention to these small animals living in our streams, but they are affected by pollution and habitat changes. By collecting a sample of them, we can use them as bioindicators to assess the quality of the stream they live in.”
Upon completing training and certification, volunteers may adopt a stream site to monitor water quality and contribute to a state-wide dataset using these RiverWatch survey methods.
No previous knowledge or experience is required to attend RiverWatch workshops. The workshops will provide enough information for volunteers to monitor streams, whether they have a biology degree or want to better understand the stream in their backyard.
RiverWatch workshops will be held across the state, including three local workshops:
4/5 – Jersey County – Grafton
4/23 – Madison County – Alton
4/26 – St. Clair County – Belleville
Other Training Workshops
4/5 – Will County – Joliet
4/6 – Fulton County – Lewistown
4/12 – Lake County – Lake Forest
4/12 – Champaign County – Mahomet
4/12 – Dekalb County – Genoa
4/13 – DuPage County – Warrenville
4/19 – Macon County – Decatur
4/26 – Vermilion County – Westville
4/26 – Winnebago County – Rockford
4/27 – Peoria County – Peoria
5/3 – McHenry County – Richmond
5/4 – Kankakee County – Bourbonnais
Continuing education credits are available for current Illinois educators. Those interested should make a note on their registration form at https://bit.ly/RWWorkshops25.
The registration fee is $50 for adults, including a copy of the RiverWatch manual and invertebrate identification resources. Up to two children per registered adult may attend at no cost. If you need support for the price of the workshop, please contact RiverWatch staff about a scholarship.
For more information, visit www.ngrrec.org/Riverwatch or contact Griffis at [email protected] or (618) 468-2781.
About National Great Rivers Research and Education Center (NGRREC)
Founded in 2002 as a collaborative partnership between the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Lewis and Clark Community College, NGRREC is dedicated to the study of great river systems and the communities that use them. The center aspires to be a leader in scholarly research, education, and outreach related to the interconnectedness of large rivers, their floodplains, watersheds, and their associated communities. To learn more about NGRREC, visit www.ngrrec.org.
