WaterAware - A National Weather Service Hydrology Outreach Initiative

Flooding and drought are among the most fatal and costly weather-related phenomena. One of the best ways to mitigate damage to life and property due to these disasters is to provide education on flood safety, drought mitigation, and the science behind National Weather Service (NWS) river and flood forecasts. WaterAware does just that by serving as the new NWS hydrology outreach program starting with children in kindergarten and continuing through adulthood.

The initiative supports a water-ready public with outreach materials spanning the temporal scales of water resource issues, from flash flooding, flood inundation, and dam breaks to drought, snowmelt runoff, and water supply.

WaterAware consists of a group of on-demand NWS hydrologic outreach representatives who can be scheduled for in-person or virtual educational sessions. We offer a variety of high-quality hydrology and water resources materials and activities tailored to each age group.

The WaterAware program provides much more than just educational outreach sessions. We have additional subgroups that handle topics such as recruitment of new NWS Hydrologists, minority outreach and recruitment, and graphic design of our materials. We will discuss how WaterAware is being promoted within the NWS agency and to the public, as well as what WaterAware can do for you.