Thursday, October 25, 2007
Ghosts, goblins and parent teacher conferences!
Well here I am on parent teacher conference night. I'm sitting here, gazing at my beautiful new bulletin board and thinking of all the things I should be doing at home right now! LOL... I wish more high school parents would come talk to me about thier kids. Or maybe I don't. I really hate the way this goes- your kid is doing well.... they could be doing better? Do I really know if they could or not? I always think people can do better. I guess I should be asking what parents want thier kids to do. Maybe I'm sitting here going over how much better the C could be if they would just do this and this and that for no reason. Maybe they are all perfectly happy with the C. Or maybe they were until I pointed out that I thought it was sub par. Hell of a deal. I'm looking forward to Halloween. Too bad I'm on a diet. Oh well, at least maybe I can scare someone. ;0
Wednesday, October 24, 2007
Water conservation comes home to Mescalero
Todd Fuqua toddf@ruidosonews.com
Article Launched: 10/23/2007 08:36:16 PM MDT
Article Launched: 10/23/2007 08:36:16 PM MDT
Familiarity can breed contempt, or at the very least, ignorance.
Those who live bordered on all sides by the Lincoln National Forest may be completely unaware of the natural resources which abound in their backyard - and all the work put into preserving them.
That was the point behind instructor Ashley Lamb's efforts to involve her science class at Mescalero High School in the World Water Monitoring Day Oct. 11.
"It was an interesting day for them," Lamb said. "They got to see career opportunities that were in the area that they may not have thought about before."
Students from Mescalero joined Alamogordo students, led by Paula Peters, on visits to the Mescalero Tribal Fish Hatchery and the Mescalero Apache Wastewater Treatment Facility and conducted sampling of the Rio Tularosa.
Lamb and Peters hoped the day's activities would open the students' eyes not just to the effects they personally have on water and the environment, but also to the job possibilities right here at home.
"I hope to have a lot of students looking into water conservation, biology and chemistry coming out of this," Lamb said. "We're planning to add a lot more classes to our regular curriculum next year that focus on water and natural resources."
While at the fish hatchery, students learned about watersheds from Tribal Water Specialist Beth Skaggs and about the hatcherey's daily operations from specialist Kai-T Blue-Sky.
They discussed relationships between stream health, fish and wildlife and plant health, and how this relates to human health.
This was not the first time Blue-Sky had spoken to some of the students, as he regularly visits Lamb's classes and has been hard at work creating a student organization at Mescalero High dedicated to conservation.
At the wastewater treatment facility, students learned about water purification and were surprised to see wastewater can be cleaned and returned to the environment with a great deal of efficiency.
The scene along the Rio Tularosa was an idyllic one, as students sat along the banks of the stream and heard from New Mexico Environment Depart-ment specialist Chris Caravan about surface water quality montoring.
After that talk, students got to test the water themselves, collecting benthic organisms using nets in the river. The final stop on the tour took students to the Tularosa Water Treatment Facility, where they saw the purification system that takes water from the Rio Tularosa and prepares it for consumption by Tualrosa residents.
Afterwards, Mescalero students logged information they gathered on benthic invertebrate findings on a Web site sponsored by World Water Monitoring Day.
Lamb said this is but the first of several field trips she hopes to organize which emphasize both the surrounding environment and the career opportunities in forest management.
"The next thing we're working on is canopy mapping of the forest around the school and learning how to make it more defensible in case of a fire," Lamb said. "Living inside a forest and this close to a river is a big advantage for us."
Those who live bordered on all sides by the Lincoln National Forest may be completely unaware of the natural resources which abound in their backyard - and all the work put into preserving them.
That was the point behind instructor Ashley Lamb's efforts to involve her science class at Mescalero High School in the World Water Monitoring Day Oct. 11.
"It was an interesting day for them," Lamb said. "They got to see career opportunities that were in the area that they may not have thought about before."
Students from Mescalero joined Alamogordo students, led by Paula Peters, on visits to the Mescalero Tribal Fish Hatchery and the Mescalero Apache Wastewater Treatment Facility and conducted sampling of the Rio Tularosa.
Lamb and Peters hoped the day's activities would open the students' eyes not just to the effects they personally have on water and the environment, but also to the job possibilities right here at home.
"I hope to have a lot of students looking into water conservation, biology and chemistry coming out of this," Lamb said. "We're planning to add a lot more classes to our regular curriculum next year that focus on water and natural resources."
While at the fish hatchery, students learned about watersheds from Tribal Water Specialist Beth Skaggs and about the hatcherey's daily operations from specialist Kai-T Blue-Sky.
They discussed relationships between stream health, fish and wildlife and plant health, and how this relates to human health.
This was not the first time Blue-Sky had spoken to some of the students, as he regularly visits Lamb's classes and has been hard at work creating a student organization at Mescalero High dedicated to conservation.
At the wastewater treatment facility, students learned about water purification and were surprised to see wastewater can be cleaned and returned to the environment with a great deal of efficiency.
The scene along the Rio Tularosa was an idyllic one, as students sat along the banks of the stream and heard from New Mexico Environment Depart-ment specialist Chris Caravan about surface water quality montoring.
After that talk, students got to test the water themselves, collecting benthic organisms using nets in the river. The final stop on the tour took students to the Tularosa Water Treatment Facility, where they saw the purification system that takes water from the Rio Tularosa and prepares it for consumption by Tualrosa residents.
Afterwards, Mescalero students logged information they gathered on benthic invertebrate findings on a Web site sponsored by World Water Monitoring Day.
Lamb said this is but the first of several field trips she hopes to organize which emphasize both the surrounding environment and the career opportunities in forest management.
"The next thing we're working on is canopy mapping of the forest around the school and learning how to make it more defensible in case of a fire," Lamb said. "Living inside a forest and this close to a river is a big advantage for us."
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)