"Don't be selfish, save the shellfish"
by ELizabEth Harrison
Do you love sushi? Ride your bike or walk to school! Your actions are connected to the health of our oceans. Every positive choice you make effects the health of our ecosystem.
To some, it might seem too early and too cold on a Saturday morning to be out of bed let alone out in a creek, but to the eager Ocean Conservation Club from John Swett High School, this day couldn’t have come any sooner. After spending weeks learning about climate change and global warming, molding carbon dioxide molecules out of clay to represent ocean acidification, and using beans to count renewable energy sources - this moment is everything.
To some, it might seem too early and too cold on a Saturday morning to be out of bed let alone out in a creek, but to the eager Ocean Conservation Club from John Swett High School, this day couldn’t have come any sooner. After spending weeks learning about climate change and global warming, molding carbon dioxide molecules out of clay to represent ocean acidification, and using beans to count renewable energy sources - this moment is everything.
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The students shuffle down the creek bank in a single-file line past the opening in the chain-link fencing, various pieces of equipment in hand. As they stand at the creek's edge, staring at the trash speckled among the reeds and algae, the students take time to reflect on all they have learned about pollution. If everyone were to throw one piece of trash into this creek every day, what would happen to our oceans? The life that inhabits them? To us?
With help from our partners at The Energy Coalition and Rodeo Sanitary District, we purchased professional grade water monitoring equipment for the students. Over the course of the program, the students learned about anthropogenic impacts on the environment as well as how to lessen their own impact. To begin, the students were engaged in conversations about climate change. Then we went through hands-on activities teaching the students about water chemistry, waste and pollution, and creek water quality monitoring. All of the curriculum led up to the students getting hands-on experience in their local creek in Rodeo. |
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The students all take turns pressing buttons, vigorously shaking vials to dissolve a curious pink tablet, and scribbling numbers in charts. Real scientists for the day. After all of the preparation, the minutes seem to fly by. Their day by the creek comes to an end and the students are happily surprised by the health of Rodeo Creek- perhaps it’s a testament to the resiliency of nature, or perhaps it’s from all of the hard work by people like you and the students to protect the environment.
