Local students get hands dirty defending natural resources

NORTH LIBERTY - Hundreds of seventh-graders spent Wednesday serving their community by cleaning up its natural environment.

'It teaches us how to help our community and the environment, and we get to have a fun day outside the classroom,” said Anna Moore, one of 266 North Central Junior High students participating in the school's annual Defenders of Land and Water Program.

'Instilling a spirit of community service is one of North Central's goals,” said science teacher Lindsey Downes, who coordinates the 10-year-old program.

The seventh-graders study watersheds and ecosystems for three weeks in the classroom before the outdoor service day, conducted mainly in community parks and along Muddy Creek, which borders several schools, she said.

At the end of the unit, the students 'come out a lot more environmentally conscious,” North Central Principal Jane Fry said.

In a single day, the students donate a combined 2,000 hours of community service, according to Downes, who said feedback from parents and the community has been overwhelmingly positive.

'You can really see the progress they're making” in clearing brush, planting trees and shrubs and testing the quality of the water in Muddy Creek, Mayor Amy Nielsen said.

North Central, she said, 'does a great job teaching things like civic pride that aren't in the books.”

Hannalaura Vedepo and Raquel Trolliet, among about 25 students assessing aquatic life in Muddy Creek, teamed up to net several damsel flies, harbingers of good water quality.

'I've learned a lot so far. It's fun. I don't think I would learn to test water quality anywhere else,” Vedepo said.

Since the program's inception, more than 2,000 kids have learned about threats to Iowa's water quality, the implications of those threats and what can be done about it, said Dave Ratliff, who coordinates the unit's water quality component.

'Ten years ago, the kids who went into Muddy Creek to sample water had to wear gloves to protect themselves from contaminants,” said Ratliff, a veteran participant in the Department of Natural Resources Iowater volunteer water monitoring program.

Such measures, he said, no longer are required after the city's multimillion-dollar 2008 upgrade of its wastewater treatment plant.

Lucy Hershberger of Forever Green landscape service in North Liberty, a program sponsor since the beginning, said she loves spending time outdoors each spring with the students.

The experience, she said, has helped many students get 'hooked on nature,” which helps them become, as the program's name implies, 'defenders of land and water.”