Throughout this semester I have learned so much and gained a new appreciation for the environment and protecting it. The EACAP project my group participated in was Berks Nature. This was such a great hands on experience where I got to see my work put to use. I know that the water testing I did will lead to cleaner water for Berks county and that is really special. It is a great feeling to know I am doing my part in keeping our planet healthy.
This whole semester has consisted of each individual in our class making a difference in our community through the environment. Our group worked with Berks Nature doing water testing and I was very hands on when it came to doing the tests, so I always compared the results from each location when I put the information in my notepad on my phone. On Gaige Day, going around to each of the other groups presentations and posters, I saw how we all contributed to some aspect of the community whether it was picking up trash, plants, animals (birdhouses), water, and interacting with kids in schools to teach them about all the things that we were learning, so that they could have a better understanding in a kid friendly learning experience. In the beginning of the semester, I thought to myself that I was going to hate this class because it was not something I would like or usually do or talk about, but after taking this class, I am glad I did and would recommend it to people who maybe have the same mindset that I had coming in.
On Thursday, April 18th we set up our station with our well created and painted poster in the Gaige lobby. We also had a GoPro video that we showed one the laptop that was fun to watch and everyone seemed to enjoy it. As people came up to our station, we talked about where we went across Berks county to do water testing and then we incorporated our issue of overpopulation into our service because overpopulation is a main cause of water being contaminated with trash and chemicals. We thought Gaige Day was fun and we enjoyed going around to everyone else’s stations and learning about what they did to help the community as well.
Our team tested water in three locations across the county. We went to Blue Marsh Lake, Jim Dietrich Park, and Cacoosing Meadows Park. We completed 6 different tests that checked the PH level, temperature, conductivity, nitrate, dissolved oxygen, and phosphorus. It took us about two hours to complete these tests at each location. The information we collected was then put into a database called Globe data entry. This database can be accessed by other members across the country as well as NASA.
Today Matt, Madison, and I worked on our ECAP project. First we worked on our contract to make it more specific and resubmitted it. We also emailed Mr. Griffith from Berks Nature to start working on getting the maps so we can chose were exactly we want to do our water testing. Next we worked on updating our progress log and adding some more important information to that. We started working on our outline for our overpopulation paper, and dividing between the three of us which points we are each going to write about in the paper. We did a little bit of research during this time, but we will continue to work on it on our own time.
On Friday, February 22nd, our group went to the Berks Nature facility and learned about the different water tests that we are going to be doing on our own with different streams of water in the area. The 3 different groups working with Berks Nature each tested different types of water (where the water came from) and it was cool to see the different results each team ended up with. We are excited to see what results we get in the different areas and different waterways.
Kristen Burdo is from Norristown, PA. She is a junior pursuing a degree in business with a focus in accounting. Kristen plays basketball here at Penn State Berks.
Matt Kreider is from Lititz, PA. He is a junior studying business administration. Matt is on the Penn State Berks golf team.
Madison Hetrick is from Grantville, PA. She is a freshman studying global studies/political science. Madison plays volleyball here at Penn State Berks.
Our group will be working with Michael Griffith, who is the Education and Watershed Specialist at Berks Nature and he will be the person running the project. Our group is looking forward to helping collect data about the water in our county and from that data that we collect,it will be given to different organizations to use for future research and local decisions on land use and restoration.
