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Lesson plan Grade 12 English Language Arts

Who Qualifies Under Caldmoor's Stormwater Credit Ordinance

A 75-minute grade 12 ELA lesson on reading regulatory language closely: students apply a fictional stormwater ordinance to three parcels and defend one determination.

Objectives

  1. Students will trace how a definitions section, rather than an operative section, decides a case.
  2. Students will apply a written definition to case data to reach a defensible determination.
  3. Students will write an argument that cites specific subsections and answers a counterargument.

Vocabulary

Impervious surface
An impervious surface is any hard surface, like a road, roof, or parking lot, that rain cannot soak through. The more impervious surface a town has, the more stormwater rushes off it.

Also: ordinance, equivalent residential unit, discretion, determination, concession

Teacher overview

Reading a regulation is not the same as reading about one, because the text has to be applied to facts before it means anything, and the outcome usually turns on a definition rather than on the section that announces the rule. This lesson uses a fictional stormwater fee ordinance from the invented Caldmoor Township and three invented parcels, and asks students to reach and defend determinations. The misconception to address directly is the belief that a definitions section is throat-clearing to skip. In this ordinance the definitions carry the whole decision, because how much impervious surface makes an ERU and whether a control treats enough area are both settled there rather than in the sections that sound consequential.

Procedure

Framing (5 min): Explain that students are working as staff for the fictional Caldmoor Township, which bills nonresidential property owners for stormwater and offers a credit to owners who manage runoff on site. Three owners have applied. Their job today is to decide who gets the credit and to write one determination letter that will survive an appeal.

Reading the ordinance (15 min): Students read Sections 2, 5, and 6 and build a decision tree on the back of the handout: which question must be answered first, which answers end the analysis, and which answers pass the decision to the Township's discretion. Push them to notice that two of the three branches are settled entirely by the definitions in Section 2, and that the branch which is not settled there is the one where the Township keeps room to decide either way. Ask which branch an applicant would rather be on, and why.

Guided practice (10 min): Model handout item 1 aloud, showing where the ERU definition is and why the arithmetic follows from the definition rather than from the fee section. Pairs then complete items 2 through 5 for the same parcel while you circulate.

Independent work (15 min): Students complete items 6 through 9 individually. These items move to the other two parcels and require them to notice that a numeric threshold is met while a records requirement is not.

Formative check (5 min): Ask for a show of hands on one question: does the ordinance require the Township to grant Caldmoor Elementary a credit? Do not move on until most of the class can name Section 6(b) as the deciding subsection and explain that the requirement is records for each of the two preceding years, not two records in total.

Drafting the determination (20 min): Each student writes a determination letter of about 200 words to the fictional school district, stating the decision on Parcel B, citing the subsections that support it, and answering the owner's strongest counterargument: that the basin treats half the parcel's impervious surface, well above the threshold, and that the missing record covers the year the basin was built. A strong letter concedes the strength of that point and still shows why the ordinance does not turn on it.

Share and revise (5 min): Two students read their counterargument paragraphs aloud. The class marks each as conceding, refuting, or ignoring the owner's point, and every student revises one sentence before submitting.

Who Qualifies Under Caldmoor's Stormwater Credit Ordinance — Grade 12 English Language Arts
Name: ____________________________ Date: ______________

Student Handout

Caldmoor Township, Brightwell Creek, and all three parcels below are fictional, invented for this lesson.

Ordinance No. 2026-4, Stormwater Utility Fee and Credit Program (excerpt)

Section 2. Definitions. "Impervious surface" means any surface that prevents or substantially restricts the infiltration of water into the soil, including roofs, paved parking areas, and compacted gravel used for vehicle traffic. Landscaped areas, unpaved athletic fields, and gravel walking paths are not impervious surfaces. "Equivalent residential unit," abbreviated ERU, means 2,800 square feet of impervious surface. "Qualifying control" means a permanent facility that retains or filters runoff from at least 40 percent of a parcel's impervious surface and that appears in the Township's approved practices manual.

Section 5. Fee. Each nonresidential parcel shall be billed monthly at the rate of $6.00 per ERU or fraction thereof.

Section 6. Credit. (a) An owner may apply for a credit of up to 40 percent of the monthly fee. (b) The Township shall grant the credit where the owner demonstrates that a qualifying control is installed and that an inspection and maintenance record has been filed for each of the two preceding calendar years. (c) The Township may reduce or deny a credit where maintenance records are incomplete. (d) A parcel of fewer than two ERUs shall be billed as two ERUs and is not eligible for a credit.

Applications received

Parcel Owner Impervious area Control installed Area treated by control Maintenance records
A Brightwell Lane Self-Storage 19,600 square feet Rain garden, listed in the manual 9,000 square feet Filed for both preceding years
B Caldmoor Elementary School 42,000 square feet Infiltration basin, listed in the manual 21,000 square feet Filed for one preceding year only
C Nettle Row Chapel 4,900 square feet None None None filed

Questions

  1. How many ERUs is Parcel A? Show the division you used.
  2. What is Parcel A's monthly fee before any credit?
  3. What percentage of Parcel A's impervious area does its rain garden treat? Round to the nearest tenth of a percent.
  4. What is the largest monthly credit Parcel A may receive under Section 6(a)?
  5. What is Parcel A's monthly bill if the Township grants the largest allowable credit?
  6. How many ERUs is Parcel B?
  7. Under Section 6(d), how many ERUs will Parcel C be billed for?
  8. Is the Township required to grant Caldmoor Elementary School a credit? Name the subsection that decides the question.
  9. May Nettle Row Chapel apply for a credit? Name the subsection that decides the question.

From Water for Schools (waterforschools.org). This material is in the public domain (CC0) and may be copied, edited, and shared freely.

Answer Key
  1. Answer: 7 ERUs. Section 2 sets one ERU at 2,800 square feet of impervious surface, and 19,600 divided by 2,800 equals 7 exactly, so no fraction of an ERU is added.
  2. Answer: $42.00 per month. Section 5 sets the rate at $6.00 per ERU, and 7 times 6.00 equals 42.00 for this fictional parcel.
  3. Answer: 45.9 percent. The rain garden treats 9,000 of 19,600 square feet, and 9,000 divided by 19,600 equals 0.4592, which rounds to 45.9 percent. Because that exceeds the 40 percent threshold in the definition of a qualifying control, the rain garden qualifies.
  4. Answer: $16.80 per month. Section 6(a) caps the credit at 40 percent of the monthly fee, and 40 percent of 42.00 is 16.80.
  5. Answer: $25.20 per month. Subtracting the 16.80 credit from the 42.00 fee leaves 25.20. Records were filed for both preceding years, so Section 6(b) obligates the Township to grant the credit.
  6. Answer: 15 ERUs. Dividing 42,000 square feet by 2,800 square feet per ERU gives exactly 15.
  7. Answer: 2 ERUs. Parcel C's 4,900 square feet is 1.75 ERUs, which is fewer than two, so Section 6(d) requires the Township to bill it as two ERUs.
  8. Answer: No, the Township is not required to grant it. Section 6(b) is the deciding subsection, because it makes the credit mandatory only where records have been filed for each of the two preceding years, and the school filed for one. Section 6(c) then permits the Township to reduce or deny the credit, which leaves the decision discretionary rather than required.
  9. Answer: No, the chapel may not apply. Section 6(d) makes a parcel of fewer than two ERUs ineligible for a credit, and the chapel's 1.75 ERUs falls below that line regardless of what it might install later.

Differentiation

Support

Provide the ordinance with its modal verbs, "shall" and "may," already highlighted in two colors and a completed model of item 1, including the division written out. Reduce the independent set to items 6 through 8, and give the determination letter a four-sentence frame: decision, subsection cited, the owner's best point, and why that point does not change the outcome under the fictional ordinance.

Extension

Ask students to draft an amendment to Section 6 that would let the Township grant a partial credit to an owner in the school's position without abandoning the records requirement, then explain in a short note which existing subsection their amendment would have to modify and what new ambiguity it introduces.

ELL supports

Pre-teach "shall," "may," "eligible," and "credit" as a set, since the difference among them carries the lesson, and post a one-line contrast for each. Allow items 1, 2, 6, and 7 to be answered with the number and the division alone. Provide the determination letter frame described under Support to any student who requests it.