Being the Change at Clean Water Action

By Zachary Turkheimer, Clean Water Action Maryland Intern - Follow Our MD Team on Twitter (@CleanWater_MD) “Be the change you want to see”, that’s the motto that I have tried to live my life by. I believe this motto is applicable with the goals of Clean Water Action because they set the precedent of what changes they strive to see in our society. I lived in the small town of Olney, MD for my whole life up until I moved to Towson, MD for college. I will be entering my junior year in the fall. I am an Environmental Science Major with a focus in Policy and Management and a minor in Political Science. I became interested in this field after I took an environmental science course in high school. Growing up in a town that has many streams and rivers near by, I became very interested about the effects we as a society have on water. I grew up enjoying the Chesapeake Bay and its watershed by fishing in the rivers that feed into the Bay and fishing for rockfish in the Bay. While taking an environmental science course in high school, I spent a weekend at the Karen Noonan Center on the Chesapeake Bay. That weekend showed me the importance of clean water to our society. I enjoyed learning about the different aspects of the Chesapeake Bay and the issues it has been facing. I have always enjoyed taking in nature and what is has to offer. So, when I met one of the members of the Clean Water Action team at a career fair at Towson University and had a brief conversation with him about what Clean Water stands for, I jumped at the opportunity to work with them. The fact that this organization does not specifically affiliate with a party and instead with an electorate is also one of the reasons why I sought the opportunity out to work with them. Protecting clean water is very important to me, as I know how important it is for a society to function. Any modern society needs a large source of clean water for survival in terms of drinking water, agriculture, and any other purposes that water serves for a modern city. If our societies want to function at maximum potential, then having a substantial supply of clean water is necessary.