Pacific Grove Museum of Natural History

The grant will support up to 1,000 students who participate in our Watershed Guardians program. This program gets students in grades 6-12 to their local watershed to conduct water quality testing and participate in community science and stewardship. Students gain hands-on scientific research and data collection skills, gain experience using tools and methods employed by field scientists, and learn to analyze data. 

We are requesting three Vernier water testing probes and four refurbished cellphones  for use solely for the apps that students use to take water quality data in the field: the Vernier Graphical Analysis app, which pairs via Bluetooth with the Vernier probes to test dissolved oxygen, pH, and electrical conductivity and the GLOBE app, which, when we are connected to WiFi, students use to upload water quality data to the GLOBE.gov database. 

Through place-based inquiry of their local watershed and learning about human impacts to the health of the ecosystem, students grow a sense of agency and connection to place, which in turn nurtures their ability to be positive advocates for and stewards of their local ecosystems and communities.