Weekly roundup: Students test storm water quality, governor wants more money for schools, and more

Fifth-grade teacher Pam Conti from Pegasus School in Huntington Beach is on a mission to take water samples from Dana Point, and more from the Santa Ana River in Huntington Beach, back to her fifth-grade class to conduct tests to find out just how bad the water is after the first major rain of the winter season.

The Orange County Register chronicled the teacher’s efforts this week to help students use scientific skills they’ve learned in the classroom and apply in the real world.

Education News title card“It’s our first flush,” Conti, also volunteer for the Surfrider Foundation’s Huntington and Seal Beach chapter, told the Register.

“Today is the big day where all the trash, pollutants, cigarette butts, Styrofoam, and animal waste come down from all the cities and down the watershed. Orange County is a big place. And there’s no filter,” she said. “Everything that gets put in the streets, gutters, or when people don’t pick up after their pets, it gets washed out here. You’re getting all that waste in the ocean in one swoop.”

Conti, the environmental director for The Pegasus School, on two types of pollutants for her classroom lessons — those you can see, such as the litter that comes down the waterways — and those you can’t, such as the bacteria that increases the chances of swimmers and surfers getting sick, the Register reported.

Here are a few other news articles from across the region for the week ending Jan. 12.

  • Two teams from OCDE’s Deaf and Hard of Hearing Program at Venado Middle School in Irvine recently made it to the playoffs in the national Battle of the Books reading competition hosted by Gallaudet University in Washington, D.C.
  • A colossal new mall is set to open in Tustin the first week of February. Yet rather than shops and eateries, this conglomerate will offer music, athletics and academics. Lyceum Village occupies a 20,000-square-foot building at an industrial park bordering Irvine.

Keep up to date with the latest education stories from throughout Orange County by bookmarking newsroom.ocde.us.