ALGAL BLOOMS

2016, Reston, VA, USA

Students at Dogwood Elementary School are concerned about the rise of algal blooms in the Sugarland Run Headwaters watershed in Reston, VA and want to lead the charge in cleaning up existing blooms and preventing future blooms from occurring. For two years the Dogwood Eco-Club has been monitoring the growth of algal blooms in Stratton Woods pond. Through their research, they learned that one of the causes of algal blooms is when humans add nutrients to their lawns. When it rains, the water run off moves these nutrients into lakes and ponds, causing algal blooms. The students want to start doing routine water quality monitoring of their local watershed, with the aid of the Reston Association Watershed Management team and the Northern Virginia Soil and Water Conservation team.

Their goal is to determine whether or not these are harmful algal blooms (HAB’s) and to prevent them from growing in their local watershed community. They also believe nutrient pollution and algal bloom awareness is key, and created a brochure to distribute to homeowners associations, apartment and condominium owners, and office and Industrial businesses in the Reston area. They raised over $1,200 for this project from a local foundation and will receive $200 from Nutrien to fund monitoring equipment. The first water monitoring session will take place in June 2016.

NUTRIENTS IN POTOMAC RIVER

2016, Alexandria, VA, USA

George Washington Middle School in Alexandria, VA found nitrate levels in the Potomac River were twice the normal level, putting organisms in the environment at risk. Upon further research and after surveying members of the community, the students found that the major cause of high phosphate and nitrate levels in the Potomac is improper application of fertilizer.

The students partnered with Greenstreet Gardens, a local garden shop, to educate community members. They created an addendum to an existing Greenstreet Gardens class to include a segment on proper fertilizer usage. They strongly believe that public education is the key to reducing the nitrate levels of the Potomac River, realizing that many people simply use the tool incorrectly. The students are advertising the classes and incentivizing attendance by raffling five mini rain garden starter packs, provided by Greenstreet Gardens. Nutrien will provide $317 for rain garden plants.

Recovering Our Streams

recovering our streams action project 2017 Carmen de Areco, Buenos Aires, Argentina

EES N°2 “Mariano Moreno” of Carmen de Areco: Students: Fátima Gonzalez

This project proposes to intervene a 1000m area on the bank of “Los Ranchos” stream, the source of the Areco river basin. The objective is to design a conservation and restoration model of the ecosystem of this riverbank. The area of intervention has been modified by anthropic activity and the proposal tends to create conditions that propriate the growth and multiplication of fish species present in the area. The area will be taken as a model to present to the riverbank owners of the Areco river basin as an opportunity to contribute with the production of biodiversity.

recovering our streams action project This project attracted the attention of many institutions that want to collaborate: It’s a collaborative project that´s being done together with the University of San Antonio de Areco (UNSAdA), University of Lujan(UNlu) and it’s being used as a Thesis of a Student, Matias Etchart, from the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). This is going to be a long – term project with more work to come.

WATER SCIENCE EDUCATION

2017, Sacramento, California, USA

Mianna Muscat hosts water science education

Mianna Muscat, of the MET Sacramento, has been involved in several previous Caring for Our Watersheds projects, including tree plantings and park clean-ups. This year, her focus was on expanding watershed education for her classmates. She wanted to find a way to engage students outside the classroom, educate them on the processes that provide water for the state, and connect them with nature. Mianna proposed a trip to the Headwaters Science Institute, during which students learn about the snowpack driven water cycle, how albedo affects rates of snowmelt, and methods scientists use to track the snowpack which makes up much of California’s water. Mianna’s proposal and implementation funds from Nutrien helped all 30 students in class to attend the trip and get this hands-on field experience in the area of Water Science and Management

WATER FILTRATION SYSTEM AT THE MET

2016, Sacramento, California, USA

Justin Yu installs water bottle filling station at MET Sacramento High School

Justin Yu, of the MET Sacramento High School successfully worked with his school’s facilities maintenance staff to install a water filtration system on campus. This project was a follow-up to his previous project, in which he provided reusable water bottles to his classmates and delivered a presentation on the negative effects single-use plastic bottles have on the environment, and the benefits of reusable bottles. While many of the students used the bottles, some would still bring plastic bottles claiming they did it not for convenience, but for water quality issues. Providing the water filtration system would provide clean, filtered water to students, and encourage reusable bottle use—a win- win for their health, thirst, and the environment. According to the counter on the unit, within a month of installation, they had already saved 1400 water bottles!

AERATION MODIFICATION

2017, CINCINNATI, OH, USA
Aeration Modification
Matthew Murphy of Oak Hills High School knew that he wanted his project to be both simplistic and effective, with the main focus to be his school’s bathrooms. Matthew’s high school building is older and hadn’t been renovated in a very long time, making the bathrooms a prime candidate for a water conservation project.

He found inspiration when he took a school field trip to the Ohio River with his AP Environmental Science class. There they discussed the issue of combined water sewer systems in the Ohio River Watershed; essentially when there is too much rain, the sewer system bypasses the water treatment plant and deposits a ton of pollution into the Ohio River. This outing helped to establish the primary goal of his project: reduce the total amount of water that Oak Hills puts into its combined sewer systems as a means to reduce the total waste put into the river during periods of heavy rain.

Matthew’s solution was to replace the faucet aerators in all the bathroom sinks around the school. An aerator is the part of the sink faucet where the water comes out. The old aerators in the school used 2.2 gallons of water per minute, equating to a total of 360,000 gallons of water over the course of 95 days. (2,650 people x 2 trips a day x 20 seconds x 2.2 GM x 95 days). The new aerators that he purchased for his school only used 0.5 gallons of water per minute, this in turn should only use 80,000 gallons of water over 95 days. (2,650 people x 2 trips a day x 20 seconds x 0.5 GM x 95 days)

This project not only has the ability to help the school conserve water, it also will allow the school to save roughly $2,000 every 95 days. In turn, he plans to propose using these dollar savings to hold a mini watershed project in his high school. Discussing water conservation and rewarding innovative thinking will help future classes of students create a more environmentally sustainable school. Matthew’s hope is that year after year, students continue the work to improve the school’s sustainability.

WEED-EX

2017, CINCINNATI, OHIO, USA

Claire Erny and Jacob Berry knew that residents in their hometown of Wyoming, Ohio yearned for a luscious and weed-free lawn. The dangers of trying to accomplish this goal can be serious and can contain a lot of chemicals and waste that may end up leaching into the waterways, affecting all aquatic life and drinking water. Jacob and Claire decided to come up with a recipe for an environmentally friendly and safe weed killer that is proven just as effective as other weed killers, but much more environmentally friendly, safer and a lot cheaper.

After looking at countless articles about natural weed killers, their teacher, Mr. Neimiller, informed them that he uses “vinegar and dawn dish soap” on his lawn at home, and it works wonders. To make a gallon of this weed killer, residents would need about one gallon of distilled white vinegar and two tablespoons of Dawn dish soap. Before deciding if they wanted to take on this project, Jacob and Claire needed try out this recipe for themselves. They soaked countless weeds with their homemade weed killer and approximately three hours later returned and the results were even better than expected.

The town of Wyoming has a smartphone app called ‘Next Door Wyoming’ people in the community can try to find babysitters, a cheap plumber, someone to walk their dog, pretty much anything. Jacob and Claire decided to make a post on Next Door Wyoming explaining their project and asking the citizens if they would like to try a bottle of the natural and homemade weed killer. Jacob and Claire expected to make about 10-15 bottles of weed killer, but received 40 requests in just 20 minutes. They quickly made extra bottles and dropped the weed killer off the next day and asked that residents email the results back to them.

Just one day after delivering the weed killer to all the residents, many emails came back with positive results and pictures. Not a single resident had a negative comment; some families even said they were going to stop using their old weed killer and start using the homemade version. Their favorite report came from a horticulturist from the Cincinnati gardens who said that her team was going to start using the homemade weed killer. They were able to book the Civic Center for late May (about a month after the final competition) and held an event to further educate the citizens on what a positive and major impact this has on our watershed, and only for $6.00.

Weed-Ex

HYDRATION STATION

2017, CINCINNATI, OH, USA

When faced with the challenge to improve her local watershed, Annie Smith thought of her school drinking water fountains. Her school is very old and while it has been remodeled several times, it seems several of the drinking fountains never got updated. So she developed a project she called the “Hydration Station.” It all started when she saw the enormous amounts of plastic water bottles being thrown away at her school. Her idea was to start the process of installing automatic water bottle refill stations around the school in order to reduce the number of plastic water bottles that Oak Hills High School throws away every single day.

Annie worked with the Caring For Our Watersheds staff, her mentors, teachers and Winnsupply company in Fairfield to acquire two water fountains to be installed in the school. Maintenance staff installed the first fountain (pictured below) in one of the main hallways within the school in order to maximize the usage of the fountain. After less than a week of being installed, the water fountain had already saved 395 water bottles, a number that will hopefully continue growing. That’s right, almost 400 bottles in just one week.

Annie graduated just after the CFW finals, but in the future she hopes to revisit the school and see how many water bottles have been saved. She hopes to take this newly collected data and propose that all the water fountains at Oak Hills High School be replaced with new water bottle filling stations. If this is successful, she plans on reaching out to the superintendent and proposing that all old water fountains in the district be replaced with new water bottle filling stations. She also hopes to work with the Oak Hills “Spirit Shop”, or book store, to get reusable water bottles with the Oak Hills logo on them, to be purchased and used by students and staff at the water fountains. The janitors had some issues with the ‘old’ plumbing, but they were able to build a frame to mount the new filling station. Persistence pays off.

Purgin’ Sturgeon

2017, Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada Purgin Sturgeon student action implementation project students with canoes

Luke Roffey from Westwood Collegiate is passionate about the creek near his home. “Sturgeon Creek provides vital habitat for many species of birds, mammals, amphibians, and fish, and it’s a critical piece of nature in an otherwise urbanized landscape.” He proposed an underwater cleanup with his peers using canoes and litter removal equipment.

Purgin Sturgeon student action implementation Luke in canoe “An underwater litter removal project has never been done in Sturgeon Creek before, and judging by the amount of garbage Westwood students remove from the banks of the creek each year, there is likely a lot of garbage under the surface that needs to be cleaned up. Removing garbage from an aquatic ecosystem such as a stream greatly increases the quality of the habitat for wildlife. Gone are hazards that can cause injury and entanglement for animals. Removing floating and submerged garbage will dramatically increase not only the natural beauty of the park, but also the functionality of the ecosystem.

Many people, especially youth, have become very disconnected with the environment, and participating in my project will allow them to reconnect with nature. Canoeing in particular can be very therapeutic, thus by participating in my project students will not only be bettering their local watershed, but also bettering themselves.”

Upon hearing of the project, a local company “Wilderness Supply” offered to loan all of the equipment free of charge. During the cleanup, students engaged with passerby’s explaining their project and the importance to the watershed. It was a great day they now hope to repeat on an annual basis.

Building Local Rain Gardens

2017, Campbellford, Ontario, Canada

In 2017, Paige a grade eight student at Hillcrest Public School proposed the idea of building a rain garden,and placed 3^rd overall. The idea being that the garden would help to mitigate the amount of runoff entering the local waterway.

She picked a spot in her local community of Campbellford where roads surround the entire perimeter of the canal. After a rain fall the water off of these roads can wash things like sand and salt but can also wash car oils, dirt, animal waste. This then enters directly into the canal and can cause issues.

The project was completed in June of 2017, with the help of her classmates at Hillcrest Public School. She is implementing this rain garden as a solution to storm water problems in her local community, to reduce the amount of runoff going directly from the roads into the local canal, in hopes to improve the water quality.