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WMS student wins water essay contest

Davis Knowles, a student at Whitewater Middle School, was recently named the Fayette County winner of the annual Clean Water Campaign/waterSmart Essay Contest.

Linda Wells, vice-chairman of the Fayette County Commission, presented the award in early November, presenting Knowles with a poster and certificate in front of more than 100 students who participated in the contest.

“We have three sources of water in Fayette County,” Wells told the students. “Lake Kedron, Lake Peachtree and Lake Horton can produce over 20 million gallons of water each day.”

Knowles took a clever and unique approach in his essay, creating a make-believe town called Hydroville that wasn’t careful with its water and ended up in bad shape.

The essay highlights what happens if you don’t conserve water and prevent pollution.

“The now browned and crumpled landscape of Hydroville is a result of carelessness,” Knowles wrote about the fictional community. “People abused the valuable resource of water and now pay for their actions every day of their lives. The freedom to bathe as often as you like, the freedom to choose the foods that you want to eat and the freedom to choose how to spend relaxation time is now controlled by the consumption and use of water.”

The annual essay contest is held to encourage children and parents to address the growing need to improve water quality and conservation efforts in Georgia. Students researched and shared their thoughts on why conserving water and preventing water pollution is important for the future of their river, lakes and streams.

The main goal of this program was to encourage students to create solutions to water conservation and water quality in metro Atlanta.

The contest was open to sixth-, seventh- and eighth-graders in Bartow, Cherokee, Clayton, Cobb, Coweta, DeKalb, Douglas, Fayette, Fulton, Forsyth, Gwinnett, Hall, Henry, Paulding, Rockdale and Walton counties.

Winners were selected in each county and an overall winner was selected from the county winners. County winners were awarded a Clean Water Campaign/waterSmart certificate given by their respective elected official at an award presentation. Essays can be read online by going to www.cleanwatercampaign.com and clicking on the essay contest link.