Eleven Notre Dame Academy students went to Dutchman’s Creek on Hansen Road this past Tuesday with Environmental Science teacher Grace Corrvieau to run tests on the creek.

“The purpose of the field trip was to allow students to gain hands-on experience with collecting environmental data in the field, which is a skill that is crucial to the area of environmental science. The data that we collected will be sent back to UWGB’s collection database and added to the data collected by other school groups around the area,” said Corrvieau.

The students tested for the pH levels in the water (acidity and basicity), conductivity (the amount of dissolved salts), dissolved oxygen levels and turbidity (the clarity of the water).

“All of these are deemed ‘physical parameters.’  We were also hoping to measure the rate of stream flow, but water levels were too high. The Lower Fox River Watershed Monitoring Program (LFRWMP) Coordinator, Lynn Terrien, also took water samples to run tests on water chemistry back in the lab. She tested for ammonium, nitrates and phosphates,” explained Corrvieau.

Terrien, a former Southwest High School teacher, is now the coordinator of the LFRWMP and helped the students take these tests at Dutchman’s Creek.

This trip was a follow-up to the Water Symposium field trip that took place earlier this year.

“Several high school groups presented at the symposium, using the water quality data they collected at their stream to assess a research question they created,” said Corrvieau. 

“Mrs. Mattke and I plan to conduct another stream monitoring field trip this summer with the Environmental Club and future IB ESS students to continue collecting data. With any luck, we will continue collecting water quality data for many years to come,” she added.

The students who participated in the field trip were Jacob Vanooyen, Liam Blakney, Ben Wolcanski, Taylor Quinn, Clisedia Jaimes, Mya Hollihan, Anika Gerl, Rian Schrader, Brayden Davis, Anna Hunt and Jaqueline Zacharias