Students enrolled in the two-year Tucker Fellows program began their study of the Tennessee River with a week-long summer experience in late June funded by the Tucker Foundation. Selected prior to their freshman year, the Fellows began with experiential learning that started on the river and continued during an overnight stay at the Pot Point Cabin.
Paddling kayaks through the river gorge with two girls from Chattanooga Girls Leadership Academy, Larkin Brown, Claire Calhoun, Lauren Kerfoot, and Charlotte Vance headed downstream to the cabin where they learned about the history of the Tennessee River from former Chattanooga historian and GPS alumna Patrice Hobbs Glass ’88.
Rick Huffnes from the Tennessee River Gorge Trust also spoke to the Fellows about forest health as one of the largest contributors to clean water and about the need for more diversity in the conservation community.
As the week’s activities continued, the girls were introduced to many issues affecting their local watershed. They heard from scientists with the Tennessee Aquarium Conservation Institute and managers of the Wastewater Treatment Plant. They toured the Chickamauga Dam and Raccoon Mountain and then put on their waders to collect fish on South Chickamauga Creek.
Their learning about the historical, ecological, political, economic and aesthetic significance of the Tennessee River has only just begun. Over the next two years, they will engage in interdisciplinary scholarship, learn more about the river and watershed, read and discuss works of current and past environmental thinkers, and work with local experts.
By the end of the program, after collecting, analyzing, and publishing data about a focused topic, they will propose solutions to watershed problems and become life-long advocates for clean, healthy watershed in the Chattanooga area and beyond.