Description

West Atlanta Watershed Alliance (WAWA) is an internationally recognized, community-based organization advancing environmental justice, environmental education, and environmental stewardship in Atlanta’s historically Black neighborhoods. Founded in 1998 by local elders and regional volunteers, WAWA works to:

  • Support communities in Northwest and Southwest Atlanta towards collective empowerment
  • Promote environmental education and advocacy
  • Protect and restore local ecosystems, especially vital urban waterways

WAWA stewards the City of Atlanta’s Outdoor Activity Center, which includes a 26-acre old-growth forest in the Bush Mountain community. Their mission is rooted in the deep connection between people and place, honoring the cultural and ecological significance of West Atlanta’s natural resources.

SCoRE/BBISS Lead

Jennifer Hirsch, Senior Director, SCoRE

Partnership History

WAWA has partnered with Georgia Tech for nearly two decades to advance community-led, equity-centered environmental and community development work and support their vision for their Outdoor Activity Center to serve as an Environmental Education and Resiliency Hub. SCoRE’s relationship with WAWA grew out of their engagement in the Westside Communities Alliance, which was running out of Georgia Tech’s Ivan Allen College of Liberal Arts when SCoRE first opened, as Serve-Learn-Sustain (SLS), in 2015.

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Key highlights of our partnership include:

We hit a milestone in 2025, when we designed and built an Afro-centric outdoor classroom in the OAC’s nature preserve  – the result of a three-year partnership between WAWA and the VIP course, Building for Equity and Sustainability, co-founded and co-taught by SCoRE.  

This partnership continues to grow as a model of university-community collaboration rooted in trust, action, and shared purpose.

Disciplines & Faculty

WAWA’s combined emphasis on community, culture, water stewardship, and environmental sustainability makes this a collaboration welcoming to disciplines across the board. Faculty involved to date have come primarily from history and sociology, earth and atmospheric sciences, and building construction.

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Other Partners Involved

Other partners that have worked closely with SCoRE in our collaborations with WAWA include ECO-Action, the Atlanta Watershed Learning Network (a program of WAWA and ECO-Action), Lifecycle Building Center, ReBuildATL, and SKANSKA. 

Keywords

environmental justice, environmental stewardship, water stewardship, African-American communities

Associated SDGs

4 (Quality Education), 11 (Sustainable Cities and Communities), 13 (Climate Action), 14 (Life Below Water)