News location:

Canberra Today 22°/24° | Friday, March 29, 2024 | Digital Edition | Crossword & Sudoku

New mobile app lets students Run the River

A SOUTH AUSTRALIAN senator was at Questacon this morning to launch a new mobile app that aims to teach students about how fresh water from rivers is shared in Australia.

Senator for SA, Simon Birmingham.
Senator for SA, Simon Birmingham.
The new mobile game, “Run the River”, was developed by the Murray-Darling Basin Authority to help educate students about balancing demands for water in a river system, the importance of good river management and some of the complexities of managing water for multiple purposes.

As Parliamentary Secretary for the Environment, SA Senator Simon Birmingham launched the app this morning and joined students in other activities at Questacon to celebrate World Water Day, which was two days ago on Saturday, March 22.

“Each level of the game is based on a particular year in the Murray-Darling Basin’s climate history,” Senator Birmingham said. “It gives you the same weather conditions based on actual data – some drought years, some flood years –and challenges you to manage the volume of water available that year.

“As you progress from one era to the next, the towns and demands get bigger, there are more farms, and your job of making sure everyone gets their share of water becomes a lot harder.

“It very much reflects the challenges we face in managing the Murray–Darling Basin; keeping the river and its ecosystems healthy and managing the Basin’s water sustainably so that we can continue to support the industries and communities relying on that water. These are really important lessons for our younger generation to learn.”

The game has been designed to align with the outcomes for science in the Australian Curriculum.

“Run the River” is available from the App Store for Apple devices and Google Play for Android devices.

Who can be trusted?

In a world of spin and confusion, there’s never been a more important time to support independent journalism in Canberra.

If you trust our work online and want to enforce the power of independent voices, I invite you to make a small contribution.

Every dollar of support is invested back into our journalism to help keep citynews.com.au strong and free.

Become a supporter

Thank you,

Ian Meikle, editor

Share this

Leave a Reply

Related Posts

Follow us on Instagram @canberracitynews