Screening followed by "Environmental Literature" at Iowa Wesleyan College, Mt. Pleasant, IA, Oct.22,2008

How can homeowners learn about underground leaks? Can municipal governments fund such huge infrastructure repair costs? What is possible, as citizens respond to the conflicting needs for access to water and the costs of supplying it? The 35-member audience at Iowa Wesleyan College asked these and other questions after the screening of The Water Front in Mt. Pleasant, Iowa, on Wednesday, October 22, 2008. Jon Keesecker, Senior Water Organizer for Food and Water Watch, offered answers and encouraged continued research and advocacy on the issue: by becoming aware of the problem and researching, by joining with other citizens to respond, and by supporting initiatives such as the infrastructure trust fund that F&WW promotes. Several students from the audience discussed their concerns raised by the film and the information Keesecker provided in an environmental literature course on Thursday. These conversations, as well as the responses from the community members and others at the screening, demonstrate the principle of grass-roots awareness – how consciousness gets raised one conversation at time, as each person talks with the next – that the course has addressed.