VGCC Education students learn about Population Growth

Vance-Granville Community College students participated in a workshop on Feb. 25 presented by a national non-profit organization focused on Earth’s growing population. Students in VGCC’s School-Age Education program received certificates for completing the workshop, and VGCC science instructors also sat in on the presentation by Colleen C. Beck, Education Program Associate for Washington, D.C.-based Population Connection. The organization conducts hands-on workshops for teachers and future teachers throughout North America.

Jacquelin Heath, the head of the School-Age Education program, said that the workshop, entitled “Population Connection: Hands-on Activities for People and the Planet,” was particularly appropriate considering VGCC’s ongoing “green” activities focused on the environment and sustainability. Beck said that the information and tools that students gained in the workshop would help them discuss population concepts in the future with the young students in their classrooms.

Since 1975, Population Connection has developed age-appropriate curricula to complement students’ science and social science instruction about human population trends and their impacts on natural resources, environmental quality and human well-being.

Beck started the workshop by showing the organization’s award-winning video, in which students see a simulation of 2000 years of population growth, as the number of humans grows from 170 million in the year 1 A.D. to almost seven billion today. She went on to offer lesson plans for elementary school-age students, and she employed hands-on exercises to demonstrate the experience of the world rapidly growing more crowded.

Above: Jacquelin Heath (left), the head of the School-Age Education program at VGCC, introduces Colleen C. Beck, Education Program Associate for Population Connection, to present a workshop for VGCC students about how to educate children about the world’s growing population. (VGCC photo)