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Rain Garden
A rain garden was created at the Pomfret Community School. Pictured above are all the helpful gardening students. Photo by Valerie Downs.


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Rain Garden
The completed rain garden at Pomfret Community School. Photo by Phyllis Labelle.


POMFRET — A bowl-shaped rain garden is now installed at Pomfret Community School. It is designed to absorb pollutants in water from the parking lot and roof near the plants.  
Jean Pillo from the Eastern Connecticut Conservation District partnered with Mr. Hotchkiss and his fifth and sixth grade students to use the grant for the rain garden supplies. This garden is one of 100 which will dot the Eastern Connecticut landscape.
The students guided by Pillo shared in the digging, breaking up the soil, and preparing the ground for the plants.
Fifth grader Quantiwah Sangasy said she “liked the digging” and Thatcher Wood liked breaking up the soil and added, “The garden will filter the water from the drains which goes to the streams and then Mashamoquet Brook.”
Sixth graders Sophia Milardo and Livia Gerum helped plant along with their classmates. Hotchkiss said: “I want the students to learn two things. The first is that even though they are children, they can still change the world in a positive way. The other thing is that I want them to figure out how water moves through the environment and may carry pollutants into the Thames River watershed.”
The project was funded in part by USEPA and National Fish & Wildlife Foundation through a Long Island Futures Fund grant.