FREE Summer Programs At Water Works

Discover the Earth’s Problems and Solve Them

At Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center 

Science Saturdays and Matinee Sundays highlight free family

fun each weekend in July

PHILADELPHIA (June 21, 2011) –What would you do if you turned on your faucet and no water flowed? Grab the pitcher from the refrigerator or buy a bottle of water? Have you ever wondered what life would be like without easy access to clean drinking water?

Not everyone in the world can obtain clean drinking water and many populations have to come up with solutions for satisfying their thirst.  Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center’s (FWWIC) free July educational programs focus on solving the drinking water problem.

Science Saturdays are free and open to the public on July 2, 9, 16, 23 and 30 from 2 – 4 p.m. at half hour intervals. The Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center is located at 640 Waterworks Drive in Philadelphia.  For information call 215-685-0723.

Families will work together through interactive experiments by FWWIC educators at the Interpretive Center’s state-of-the-art lab using their skills and creativity to engineer a solution to the drinking water problem. Gain an understanding of how children around the world use water and obtain drinking water in a family-friendly atmosphere that will open your eyes to the problems facing our planet.

In addition to Science Saturdays, FWWIC’s Sunday Movie Matinee will screen “Home” each Sunday in July at 1:30 and 3:30 p.m. in the Interpretive Center’s nicely cooled underground media center.  This 2009 documentary, created by Yann Arthus-Bertrand and narrated by Glenn Close, focuses on the diversity of life on Earth and how humanity is threatening the ecological balance of the planet featuring entirely aerial footage of more than 50 countries. The film is carbon offset, meaning that the CO2 emissions as a result of the movie were calculated and offset by sums of money that are used to provide clean energy for those who have none. Come enjoy this 95-minute film for free with friends and family in what becomes the most “eco-friendly” movie theater in the city each Sunday in July.

The Fairmount Water Works, the ideal location to learn more about the life in the river, was constructed in 1812 to pump water from the Schuylkill River. Almost from the day the waterwheels began turning, the graceful neoclassical buildings and beautiful grounds made the place an international tourist attraction renowned for melding nature and technology. Today the Fairmount Water Works Interpretive Center is the Delaware River Basin's watershed education hub, offering visitors information about the impact of water on their daily lives and how they in turn impact their water supplies. Located off Kelly Drive in Philadelphia's East Fairmount Park, the Interpretive Center features a variety of hands-on, highly interactive exhibits including a live view of the Fairmount Dam fishway and a flyover of the Schuylkill River watershed. For more information, visit http://www.fairmountwaterworks.com/.