Student Community-Action Projects
| Replacing the Holland Avenue Sewer Line |
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By studying and testing Muddy Run stream near their school, students
discovered that a severe pollution problem existed. Their research
revealed that the causes were groundwater and stormwater runoff
infiltrating and overloading the Holland Avenue sewer line and sediment
and erosion buildup in Muddy Run. The students were not content with
just identifying the problem. They became problem solvers by launching
a 3 year (1992-94) letter-writing campaign to convince state and local
officials to correct the problem. This student activism resulted in
Huntingdon being awarded a $250,000 PENNVEST grant and a $750,000 low
interest loan to replace over 3 miles of broken sewage lines.
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| Wetland Project |
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Students set out to construct a wetland to reduce problems associated
with stormwater runoff in their community. Not only did they succeed in
constructing a wetland, but they also created an educational outreach
program for other students and demonstrated to nearby communities how
urban wetland areas can improve one of today's most pressing
environmental issues—water quality. Students wrote letters,
petitioned and made presentations to authorities for 3 years for
construction of a wetland on school property. They helped design, pay
for—over $4,000—, construct, landscape and create partnerships to build
the wetland completed in September 1996.
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| Street Tree Renewal |
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Since 1995 the HAMS Environmental Club has planted over 80 street
trees, costing $3,000, in Huntingdon Borough. The most memorable
planting occurred in 1996 when, as part of the borough's Bicentennial
Celebration, the club planted in the borough, twenty flowering trees—one
for every decade of the borough's existence. Students solicit
residential home owners who desire a street tree and raised the money by
writing grants and having environmental T-shirt sales. The club gives
the trees at no cost to the recipients.
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| Swale |
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To prevent home-basement flooding caused by stormwater runoff in a flood
prone residential section of Huntingdon and reduce erosion of Muddy Run
stream, the club created a partnership to construct a swale. The club
spent $2,500 to construct the swale—550 feet long by 35 feet wide with a
two-foot depth at the center, and stabilize the streambank with
vegetation. A group of 20 students and 10 adults put the final touches
on the project after school in September 1998. They spread grass seed,
removed rocks, placed straw, and installed plastic mesh to hold the
straw and grass down.
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| Tree Honorarium Program |
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The club in 1998, established a Community Tree Honorarium Award for
people who have made significant contributions to improve the quality of
life in Huntingdon. Five citizens and veterans were selected as
recipients the first year of the program. All were delighted to be
honored especially by youth. Hereafter, 1 to 3 citizens will be honored
each year as part of Arbor Day celebrations in the community.
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| Streambank Restoration |
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To improve the overall water quality of Muddy Run stream, in 1998, the
club became a partner with the Muddy Run Advisory Committee of
Huntingdon Borough Council to encourage private property owners along
Muddy Run to restore streambank sections of the waterway. The placement
of a 60 foot rip rap along an eroded high bank became the first project
completed in December 1998. Three restoration projects are scheduled to
be completed by the Summer of 1999.
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| Riparian Buffer and Stormwater Prevention |
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As part of Environmental Club's comprehensive stormwater prevention and
water quality improvement program this project stabilized the 550 feet
swale with a vegetated riparian zone of large evergreen and deciduous
trees and small shrubs in the Spring of 1999. Student secured funding
by co-writing and receiving a $3,600 Watershed Restoration Assistant
Program grant from the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental
Protection.
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| Public Education and Awareness |
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HAMS students have accepted the challenge to be environmental stewards
and have become leaders in community education to improve and resolve
community concerns. They make presentations at local, state, and
national conferences and are frequent presenters at local service
organizations and borough council meetings where they share their
environmental work and their findings.
Local authorities invited middle school students to be educational presenters on how to resolve problems associated with stormwater runoff in a "town meeting" April 1, 1998. Students made presentations on local water quality, household pollutants, benefits and functions of wetlands, and land management practices. |
Other Students Community Action Results
- Students conducted water quality monitoring tests of a local waterway and thus helped to resolve a local raw sewage problem.
- Students educated the public about land management practices that could help prevent stormwater runoff by delivering a paper document that they created to over 400 residences in the Muddy Run Watershed.
- Students created and disseminated a booklet about the effects of household pollutants. The booklet had thirty categories of common pollutants found in most homes and listed environmentally safer alternatives.
- Students started a school recycling program. Huntingdon Middle School students started a recycling program (of paper, cardboard, and cans) in 1992/93. This was expanded to include the high school in 1993/94.
- Students gave donations to various organizations to stop the degradation of the rain forests. Students annually donate to organizations that are trying to save/preserve tropical rain forest throughout the world. Donated over $700.00 since 1992/93.
- Students provided data for a county-wide water quality monitoring program. The middle school was the first school to sign on to this program. Information is disseminated to Huntingdon Planning Commission, Juniata College, and the state via the Bureau of State Parks. Program started during the 1993/94 school year.
- Students published letters to the editor in the daily newspaper and wrote to political leaders about their concerns for the environment. Some of the topics . . . stormwater runoff, hazardous waste, Styrofoam investigation, etc.
- Over $1500 of trees have been planted the last three years by middle school students for the prevention of stormwater runoff as well as a school improvement project.
- Students donated funds to borough to fund projects to eliminate stormwater runoff problems.
- Students designed, constructed and conducted routine maintenance of a large environmental study —flower, butterfly and hummingbird—garden adjacent to the school's wetland to provide students with more "hands-on" integrated environmental learning activities.
