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Neuse Riverkeeper Samantha Krop introduced middle-school students to the world of Riverkeepers during a presentation this week at The Exploris School in Raleigh.

Located in downtown Raleigh for more than 20 years, The Exploris School is a diverse learning community that engages students through community partnerships and experiential, project-based learning built around four core pillars: Global Education, Project-Based Learning, Co-Teaching and Responsive Classroom.

Sam used the opportunity to talk to the group about fun facts about the Neuse River and the Neuse watershed—what makes the watershed special and how the river changes from its headwaters in the Raleigh area to nation’s wideset river where it meets the Pamlico Sound. Sam was pleasantly surprised that the public charter school’s sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders were very informed about the Neuse watershed.

“The Exploris students had been actually doing a watershed study — before, they were doing a study of Little Rock Creek, and now they’re expanding that to do a study of the whole watershed they live in,” Sam said. “They really had a lot of great questions and were super-excited. It was really a lot of fun.”

Sam, who has a teaching background, said she was inspired by the students’ enthusiasm for the subject and looks forward to opportunities to work with them on their watershed analysis in the future.

“It’s really nice to be able to work with youth in our Riverkeeping world and be able to engage youth in learning about their watershed,” she said.