Blogs

Last month Arizona Project WET (APW), The University of Arizona, and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences honored the Abbott Fund and Abbott Nutrition at the Abbott Founding Sponsor Celebration! 

This weekend Kerry Schwartz and I completed the last session of a four part, 32-hour workshop with our Pinal County Water Education Cohort at Boyce Thompson Arboretum.  We wanted to hold our last workshop somewhere we could get our feet WET searching for macroinvertebrates and celebrate the hard work the cohort has put in over the school year. 

In Tucson, Arizona Project WET has the great privilege of implementing a Water Conservation Education program for the City of Tucson.  The cornerstone of the program is a third grade field trip to Sweetwater Wetlands, where students exp

In The Worst Hard Time, Timothy Egan explores the causes of the Dust Bowl and its horrific effects on the people who stayed behind. The plains of the Texas, Oklahoma, New Mexico, and Colorado area were once vast grasslands with deep roots in the soil in an area of the country with little rainfall and constant winds. By the 1930s, the area was dominated by family farms, "sodbusters" who plowed up the grasslands to plant wheat, removing the natural grasses within a fairly short time. A drought, high temperatures, and high winds soon ripped off the top soil scattering tons of soil built up over millenia. The resulting disaster killed humans and animals, blacked out skies, and isolated whole towns. Timothy Egan's research of the causes and effects of the Dust Bowl has created a cautionary tale of what ignorance and greed can do to the land that must sustain us.

At the University of Arizona, we have an e-newsletter called UA News that is published daily. Every morning, I dutifully read the headlines and, about once a week, one catches my eye enough to attract me to read the teaser, then to click on and launch the browser. And if I haven't moved onto something else by the time it opens, I might actually read the article.  Certain topics hit my hot-buttons: water, education, sustainability, and anything that might have something to do with my daughter who is a student there. This morning, I was hooked by the leading headline, "Astro 101: The Last Science Class." The teaser's introduction of the physicist who "is improving science education and making it stick with students" took me all the way.

Ed Prather, UA physicist and executive director for the Center for Astronomy Education, teaches an introductory natural science class for non-science majors.  I'm close enough to a couple university professors to know that "getting" to teach introductory level anything is usually akin to paying your dues, if not punishment. I always feel righteous indignation for the sake of the students in those classes where the professor would rather not be there. It does happen. In the case of Prather, I'm just bubbling with excitement over the fact that he's not only interested in the lower-level classes but has taken on the mission of making science education, at any level I assume, effective and fun! 

The December, 2010 issue of Biology Letters, a peer-reviewed, refereed, scientific journal of the British Royal Society contains a groundbreaking article about the ability of honeybees to learn about and remember the location of food sources.In a time when many are concerned about mass die-off of honeybees around the world, this is notable science. What is additionally interesting about the article is that it is authored by 8-10 year-old students from a village school near the lead researcher's university.  The article does not read like many scientific journal articles in that it is written in clear, concise language of children rather than in scientific jargon, and does not include a statistical analysis of the data that would be beyond the scope of the students' mathematical ability. however, it does contribute to the larger body of knowledge on honeybees, and demonstrates that even young students can successfully engage the scientific process and communicate their findings.

The key finding of the study is printed at the end of the abstract, which is largely a note from the lead researcher explaining the unique setting and population of the study's authors.  "We discovered that bumble-bees can use a combination of colour and
spatial relationships in deciding which colour of flower
to forage from. We also discovered that science
is cool and fun because you get to do stuff that no one has ever done
before." Did you get that? 

In October 2010, 6th grade students from Cactus Middle School in Casa Grande, Arizona started the first School Water Audit Program (SWAP) on their campus.  The Casa Grande Dispatch recently followed the students for a few days of their SWAP journey and published this article, capturing the magnitude and far reaching impacts of the program.  I am so proud of all of their hard work!

For more information about the School Water Audit Program or other Arizona Project WET programs available in Pinal County email Tasha Krecek-Lynch or see our website.

A few years back I built a small greenhouse, spraying foam insulation to make it airtight. Without realizing it, I exposed myself to a chemical that I was sensitive to. I developed headaches, was lethargic and basically did not feel well for a number of months. The experience set me on a course to minimize my exposure to environmental toxins.

I recently attended a forum on emerging contaminants. What I learned was a bit scary, to say the least. I guess I'm one of those people who would rather know about the bad stuff in case there is any action I personally can take. The following are the highlights of what I found out.

Remember the adage "better living through chemistry"?  Chemicals permeate our modern way of life. Many of these chemicals are in products such as personal care products, detergents, human and veterinary drugs, disinfectants, fuels, plastics, fire retardants, insecticides, and much more. Unfortunately, trace amounts of these chemicals are showing up in our local water sources

Holly recently wrote about taking students into the outdoors.  But maybe you don't know where to go - especially where to find a riparian area.  "Riparian" just means along a river or other body of water.  Live in the desert?  No problem!  There's a riparian area near you!  If you are in the greater Phoenix metropolitan area, there are actually great riparian areas to visit and enjoy.  I recently visited the Tres Rios Wetlands.  It's near I-10 and 91st Avenue.  Get information at http://phoenix.gov/TRESRIOS.  It is a fabulous site.  I saw a beaver's den and indications on the side of a pond showing where beavers had come from the pond onto the land!  The site I visited is called the Hayfield Site. I would recommend it.  It is right next to a waste-water treatment plant and is actually part of the process of the treatment plant.  No "yuck" factor, honest!  But, it does provides a wonderful opportunity to talk about where our water comes from and goes to, as well as a great place to enjoy and learn about nature.  There are lots of signs explaining the site and the plants and animals that live there.  There is also an amazing work of art that tells the story of the interaction between humans and the natural world in this area.  You'll find it if you go there!

Another great riparian area is the Rio Salado Habitat Restoration Area.  Learn about this at http://phoenix.gov/recreation/rec/parks/preserves/locations/riosalado.  What's really amazing is that this wild area is close to downtown Phoenix.  And, there are beavers there, too!

In the East Valley?  The Riparian Preserve at Water Ranch is wonderful!  Learn about it at http://www.riparianinstitute.org/.  Enjoy and learn!  

Researching National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) online materials for a grant that I'm working on, I've become overwhelmed by the magnitude of useful images, illustrations, animations and real-time visualizations available for learning about weather, climate, oceanic influences and climate c