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PROGRAMS > EDUCATION > SCIENCE & SPANISH CLUB > SSC ARCHIVES

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Science & Spanish Club Network
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    May 2009 - SSCN connects employers with homegrown talent
    April 2009 - South Texas SSCN organizes parade, cleanup
    April 2009 - Walmart donates $1,000 to GMF's SSCN
    Feb 2009 - Trash Parade held in conjunction with Adopt-A-Beach
    Feb 2009 - Club participates in Crab Trap Removal program
    Dec 2008 - Texas Parks & Wildlife makes $5,000 donation
    Dec 2008 - Clubs visit Aransas National Wildlife Refuge
    Nov 2008 - Grant assigns SSCN six tasks to complete
    Nov 2008 - Port Isabel club teams up with Artist Boat in event
    Oct 2008 - GMF's SSCN hosts career fair in Port Lavaca
    Oct 2008 - Clubs join Audubon to clean bird habitat
    Oct 2008 - Clubs clean shoreline, attend Kayak Expo
    Oct 2008 - Bay City/El Campo clubs take part in Rice Festival
    Oct 2008 - Port Lavaca students tour local water canal
    Oct 2008 - Students reach out to local Vietnamese community
    Oct 2008 - Brownsville club starts school recycling program
    Sept 2008 - Port Lavaca students recreate local watershed
    Sept 2008 - Clubs run booth at Bayfest 2008 in Corpus Christi
    Sept 2008 - Clubs participate in fall cleanup at Redfish Bay
    Aug 2008 - Phytoplankton specialist visits SSCN classroom
    May 2008 - Leadership event includes international component
    April 2008 - Students celebrate earth and water on Earth Day
    Feb 2008 - Clubs march in parade, clean beach, restore marsh
    Feb 2008 - GMF SSCN creates first Ecology = Economy Week
    Feb 2008 - Palacios clubs create 'river dragon' for parade
    Jan 2008 - Message-in-a-bottle experiments teach students
    Dec 2007 - Clubs tour lakes, learn first hand about watersheds
    Nov 2007 - South Texas clubs participate in trash clean-up
    Sept 2007 - Coastal Bend clubs clean up, learn at Matagorda
    Sept 2007 - Clubs clean up Lighthouse Lakes Park, more
    May 2007 - 3M Corporation presents check to S&S Club
    Feb 2007 - S&S Club organizes two-town Trash Parade

SSCN connects employers with homegrown talent

Living & Working in the Coastal Zone job fair

Elizabeth Roberts from San Patricio Economic Development discusses job opportunities during the Living and Working in the Coastal Zone job fair held May 20 in Aransas Pass with SSCN members.
May 2009 - As part of a coastal workforce initiative developed by the GMF's Science & Spanish Club Network called “Living and Working in the Coastal Zone,” two job fairs were held in May to help connect local talent with local employers. The effort is a collaboration with the Texas Transportation Institute, a part of the Texas A&M University system that encourages development of homegrown talent. On May 20 more than 470 students circulated in the high school gymnasium in Aransas Pass, Texas, in a “Living & Working in the Coastal Zone” job fair with area employers who are hiring workers now or who will be in the near future. The following day, more than 450 parents and students in Edna, Texas, attended a second “Living & Working in the Coastal Zone” fair in the school gymnasium. Other similar events are planned for the Texas cities of Port Isabel on October 6 and in Port Lavaca in late October. All the events are sponsored in part by a grant from the Texas General Land Office Coastal Management Program Grant Cycle 13 and the Gulf of Mexico Alliance Environmental Education Network.

South Texas SSCN organizes parade, cleanup

2009 Bahia Grande Limpeinato Parade and Coastal Cleanup

SSCN members from Brownsville and Port Isabel participate in the 3rd annual Bahia Grande Limpeinato Parade and Coastal Cleanup on April 4.
April 2009 - The first ever “Flowing of the Rivers” ceremony was held in conjunction with the 3rd Annual Bahia Grande Limpienato Parade and Coastal Cleanup on Saturday, April 4 in Port Isabel and South Padre Island, Texas. The ceremony featured the mixing of fresh water samples

from the headwaters of the Missouri, Mississippi and Tennessee Rivers with a saltwater sample from the Gulf of Mexico to create a unique blend of water that symbolizes the connectivity of the upper 31 states with the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean ecosystems.
Water samples were provided by the Tennessee Valley Authority, Missouri River Conservation District Council, Willow Creek Reclamation Committee, Itasca State Park in Minnesota and the US Coast Guard Marine Safety Office in Port Isabel.
This year's parade was the largest ever with 37 entries and about 150 participants. All parade participants belonged to governmental or community organizations that have a common interest in stewardship of the coastal ecology of the Gulf of Mexico. Participants picked up more than 100 bags of trash. Plastics, food wrappers and beer bottles dominating the types of trash collected. A petition was also circulated, asking local governments to consider the introduction of biodegradable plastic bags in coastal communities for retailers to use.

Aransas Pass Walmart donates $1,000 to GMF's Science & Spanish Club Network
April 2009 -

Walmart in Aransas Pass, Texas, made a $1,000 Community Grants contribution in April to the Gulf of Mexico Foundation’s Science & Spanish Club Network for their Redfish Bay public education and outreach efforts. Science & Spanish Clubs in Ingleside, Sinton, Aransas Pass and Corpus Christi are involved in numerous activities around Redfish Bay, a critical habitat and State Scientific Study area with its vast sea grass pastures. The GMF greatly appreciates Aransas Pass Walmart’s contribution in support of this effort.

Fourth Annual Redfish Bay Trash Parade held in conjunction with Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup on Feb 21

Redfish Bay Trash Parade - click to view photos

SSCN members from several schools participate in the Fourth Annual Trash Parade held in Aransas Pass, Texas, on Feb 21. After marching in the parade, the students participated in the statewide Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup.
February 21, 2009 - About 100 SSCN students gathered in Aransas Pass to march through town carrying signs and dragging strings of aluminum cans behind them in the 4th Annual Redfish Bay Trash Parade and Coastal Cleanup on February 21. “This parade gives the residents of Aransas Pass and the entire Live Oak Peninsula an opportunity to learn why trash management is so important to a healthy state of our water bodies as well as to our communities on land,” said Richard Gonzales, GMF project leader for the SSCN. “Since 2003, SSCN students have been working on several coastal conservation projects in Redfish Bay and the Trash Parade is one way to broaden the environmental education outreach effort to include more residents and organizations,” he added. After the parade, the students joined other volunteers in two different Winter Adopt-A-Beach Cleanups. On the same day, Texas Parks & Wildlife conducted a Crab Trap Removal at Conn Brown Harbor. The Redfish Bay Trash Parade is sponsored by the Gulf of Mexico Foundation, Texas General Land Office, Coastal Management Program Grant Cycle 13, the City of Aransas Pass, Coastal Bend Bays Foundation, Coastal Bend Bays & Estuaries Program and OxyChem.

VIEW PHOTOS

Club participates in Crab Trap Removal program

Art Morris with Texas Parks & Wildlife talks to SSCN students about derelict crab traps and the hazards they can produce for the marine environment.
February 21, 2009 - Corpus Christi Martin Middle School Science & Spanish Club students received hands-on crab trap removal experience

from Art Morris with Texas Parks & Wildlife Department (TPWD) during the annual Texas Crab Trap Removal program. Volunteers and TPWD staff collect crab traps during a 10-day period (February 20 to March 1) when all crabbing is prohibited so that derelict traps can be removed from Texas bays. Besides being unsightly, derelict crab traps are a potential danger to wildlife that can get trapped in them as well as to boaters who may hit them and damage props or other parts of their vessel.

Texas Parks & Wildlife donates $5,000 to SSCN

Dr. Larry McKinney (yellow shirt) visits with Aransas Pass SSCN students at the Everything Kayak Expo on Oct 25.
December 2008 - For their efforts in helping to raise consciousness about the body of water near their home town called Redfish Bay, Aransas Pass SSCN students attracted the attention of Dr. Larry McKinney, former

director of Texas Parks & Wildlife. After meeting the students “Everything Kayak” Expo in Aransas Pass in October, McKinney arranged for the Texas Parks & Wildlife Foundation to make a $5,000 contribution to the GMF for projects that the SSCN is doing in the Redfish Bay State Scientific Study Area. To help educate the public about Redfish Bay, the SSCN ran a Sea Grass Dice Game and Redfish Bay Outreach booth at the October kayaking event. Club members also participate in clean-ups of the area and were instrumental in designating State Highway 361 as "Redfish Bay Causeway," a well-traveled road for kayakers, fishermen, birder watchers, boaters and other outdoor enthusiasts.

Clubs visit Aransas National Wildlife Refuge

Tonya Stinson, ANWR environmental educator, poses with SSCN students who helped clear brush in a picnic area at the refuge on Dec 15.
December 2008 - The GMF's SSCN students from Aransas Pass High School and AC Blunt Middle School helped officials at Aransas National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) to celebrate the refuge's 71st birthday by presenting a birthday cake to refuge staff during a science field trip on December 15. About 22 students climbed the refuge observation tower while braving the cold to search for endangered Whooping Cranes who winter at the Refuge. In addition, students cleared a picnic area of large and small limbs under the guidance of Tonya Stinson, ANWR environmental educator. On the way back, the students toured the new Rockport Aquarium, Cove Harbor, Conn Brown Harbor and other waterfront developments along Redfish Bay. The clubs will make the birthday cake presentation an annual event to help raise public awareness about the refuge and its migratory birds.

Grant assigns SSCN six tasks to complete
November 2008 - The GMF's SSCN was awarded the Texas General Land Office's Coastal Management Program

(CMP) grant this fall again for the second year. Using the $99,900 provided by the grant, Science & Spanish Clubs will be conducting water sampling, holding video conferencing events, expanding outreach events, promoting "Living and Working in the Coastal Zone" and exploring waterfront development issues in Redfish Bay. SSCN faculty sponsors will be involved with developing in-house coastal environmental education materials by attending a three-day faculty workshop in June 2009. The CMP grant has tasked the SSCN students and faculty sponsors to focus on the following six tasks:

Conduct coastal water quality monitoring project at Bahia Grande/Little Laguna Madre in Cameron County
Organize and participate in Ecology=Economy Weeks
Establish Coastal Expos and Earth Day Bay Day events in outdoor recreation rural coastal communities
Participate in summer faculty sponsor training and create an integrated approach to coastal environmental issues education
Conduct Redfish Bay ecotourism and waterfront development visitors survey and develop signs for Redfish Bay Causeway
Use distance learning as a tool for connecting Texas Gulf to Gulf, Gulf to Caribbean, and Gulf to upper 31 states

Port Isabel club teams up with Artist Boat in event

Nicole Eckstrom, left, of Artist Boat meets Port Isabel Mayor Joe Vega, right, and City Commissioner Guillermo Torres at the SSCN Bahia Grande Outreach booth at the Port Isabel World Shrimp Cook-Off on Nov 2.
November 2008 - GMF SSCN members from Port Isabel, Texas, teamed up with Artist Boat from Galveston to collaborate on a mini Coastal Expo at Port Isabel's World Shrimp Cook-off on Nov 2. Artist Boat is a GMF Community-based Restoration Program grant recipient based in Galveston but due to damage to its headquarters from Hurricane Ike the restoration project has been transferred to South Padre Island. Project leader Nicole Eckstrom is a native of Port Isabel and will be organizing a sand dune restoration project on South Padre Island on Nov. 15. During the Coastal Expo event, she gathered more than 30 local volunteer participants for the dune restoration project. Also in South Padre, the GMF received a $4,000 grant from the City of Port Isabel Economic Development Commission to conduct the Annual Bahia Grande Limpienato Parade and Coastal Cleanup the first Saturday in April 2009.

GMF's SSCN hosts career fair in Port Lavaca

Ranger from Aransas NWF speaks to students at career fair on Oct 28.
October 2008 - GMF SSCN students acted as hosts and guides for exhibitors at the “Living & Working in the Coastal Zone” workforce initiative, a coastal employer's career fair, held on Oct 28 at Travis Middle School in Port Lavaca, Texas. More than 650 students participated in the event that brought employers within the Texas coastal zone including Aransas National Wildlife Refuge, South Texas Nuclear Power Plant, Texas Transportation Institute, Guadalupe Blanco River Authority (GBRA), GEMCO and the City of Port Lavaca. Sponsors included GMF, GBRA and the Coastal Management Program Grant Cycle 13.

Corpus club joins Audubon to clean bird habitat

Club members particpate in the Audubon's Rookery Island Cleanup Oct 25.
October 2008 - The GMF Science & Spanish Club from Corpus Christi's Martin Middle School participated in the Audubon Society’s 2nd Annual Rookery Island Cleanup in the Upper Laguna Madre near Padre Island on Oct 25. Students documented types of marine debris found on data cards and listed brands of trash found along the spoil islands that are habitat for a number of species of birds.

Clubs clean shoreline, attend Kayak Expo

Club members attended Everything Kayak Expo in Aransas Pass Oct 25.
October 2008 - The GMF Science & Spanish Club from Sinton, Texas, conducted a shoreline cleanup at the Lighthouse Lakes Trail Park on Oct 25 in the morning and then joined Aransas Pass SSC students at the Everything Kayak Expo. Students played the Redfish Bay Ring Toss Game and received kayak training from kayak guides. Club members also toured the manufacturer and distributor demonstration area where a variety of kayak models were available. The Redfish Bay Stream Team (Corpus Christi-Sinton-Aransas Pass-Ingleside clubs) will introduce kayaking as a demonstration at the Coastal Expo/Redfish Bay Tent at the 66th Annual Shrimporee in Aransas Pass on June 5-7, 2009. Sponsors of the Oct 25 Expo were Dairy Queen of South Texas, Slow Ride Kayak Services and Coastal Management Program Grant Cycle 13.

Bay City/El Campo clubs take part in Rice Festival

October 2008 - GMF Science & Spanish Clubs from Bay City, Van Vleck, Palacios and El Campo played Seagrass Dice in the Texas Parks & Wildlife/Lower Colorado River Authority Coastal Expo Tent at the Rice Festival in Bay City Oct 17-18. Students also assisted in several other interactive activities including coastal fisheries touch tanks, discovery boxes, creating crab marsh habitat and other hands-on coastal ecology games. Sponsors were Texas Parks & Wildlife Coastal Expo, Bay City Lions Club and Coastal Management Program Grant Cycle 13.

Port Lavaca students learn about local water canal

Students participate in educational field trip to 2.6-mile canal in preserve.

October 2008 - The GMF Science & Spanish Clubs (SSC) from Calhoun High School and Travis Middle School in Port Lavaca, Texas, attended an educational field trip on Oct 16 presented by the Guadalupe Blanco River Authority (GBRA) and the GBRA Land Trust. The field trip took students on a tour of a newly refurbished, 2.6-mile water canal that assures fresh water balances for migratory water fowl. The $600,000 water canal project is located in the 3,440-acre Myrtel Foester Whitmire Preserve, which the students have been studying over the past four years. The Whitmire Preserve, located in Indianola, Texas, recently became part of the Aransas National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR), home to the endangered Whooping crane.

Students reach out to local Vietnamese community
October 2008 - The GMF Science & Spanish Club in

Trilingual T-shirt design - click to enlarge

Palacios, Texas, produced a trilingual T-shirt featuring a design that translates the top coastal environmental issues into three languages: English, Spanish and Vietnamese. The students presented one of the yellow T-shirts to Matagorda County Environmental Health Department Director Ruben Gonzales. The T-shirt will act as a tool to help students and others in the Palacios area to reach out to the pockets of Vietnamese-speaking communities along the Texas Gulf coast. The T-shirt project was paid for by funding from the Texas General Land Office Coastal Management Program Grant which the GMF received.

Brownsville club starts school recycling program

Brownsville recycling - click to enlarge

Science teacher Carson Krook and students started recycling at school.
October 2008 - The Dr. Garcia Middle School Science & Spanish Club has implemented an on-campus recycling program with a focus on paper products. In 2006, SSC students refurbished trash barrels for placement behind the school where practice fields attract an array of styrofoam, plastic, aluminum and paper debris. Faculty sponsor, Carson Krook, a science teacher, has taken the trash issue to heart and already has seen slight improvements in campus trash management.

Port Lavaca students recreate local watershed

Guadalupe River watershed model - click to enlarge

Teacher Sherrie Krause, right, oversees the recreation of a watershed.
September 2008 - The Travis Middle School and Calhoun High School Science & Spanish Clubs have taken field trips along various sections of the nearby Guadalupe River over the past five years, visiting various sections of the river which begins in the Texas Hill Country and ends at San Antonio Bay near their home town of Port Lavaca, Texas. This year, the students decided to create a model exhibit of the watershed to demonstrate its function. Students did all the work for the model, located in their school yard, including creating native plant habitat for birds and other animals living within the watershed. The clubs' next goal will be to place bilingual birding posters about song birds, migratory birds and shore birds in the exhibit.

Clubs run booth at Bayfest 2008 in Corpus Christi

September 2008 - GMF Science & Spanish Clubs from Aransas Pass, Ingleside and Corpus Christi, Texas, worked in the Gulf of Mexico Foundation's booth Sept 27-28 at Bayfest, an annual event that drew more than 100,000 visitors this year. The students gave out fish rulers and other prizes to participants who played a game called, "Seagrass Dice." The GMF educational booth was one of several booths in the Coastal Bend Bays & Estuaries Program’s "Adventure Bay" tent which focused on getting kids interested in the environment.

Clubs participate in fall cleanup at Redfish Bay

Adopt-A-Beach cleanup - click to enlarge

SSCN members pick lup trash along Redfish Bay Causeway on Sept 27.
September 2008 - GMF Science & Spanish Clubs from Aransas Pass, Ingleside, Bay City and Tidehaven, Texas, participated in the Texas

Matagorda Beach geology - click to enlarge

General Land Office's Annual Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at the Lighthouse Lakes Trail Park and Matagorda Beach on Sept 27. Later that day, the Tidehaven students measured the sand dunes at Matagorda Beach with the University of Texas Bureau of Economic Geology, as they have done for the past four years, participating a dune erosion monitoring study.

Phytoplankton specialist visits SSCN classroom
Phytoplankton monitoring training

Jeff Paternoster and Sherrie Krause help students use microscopes.
August 2008 - GMF SSCN students from Port Lavaca received one day training on phytoplankton monitoring from Jeff Paternoster, outreach specialist from the Southeast Phytoplankton Monitoring Network in South Carolina, on August 5 at Travis Middle School. Science teacher Sherrie Krause's has been the SSCN faculty sponsor for six years. Her club has more than 34 members. As part of their phytoplankton studies, students will collect weekly water samples, analyze water chemistry and report to the national phytoplankton monitoring program. The Texas Master Naturalists Midcoast Chapter, which also participate in this volunteer-based monitoring project, will work with the SSCN students over the coming year. Paul and Mary Meredith, retired college professors who live in Vistoria, and Krause are Master Naturalists and will guide the students in hands-on data collection that seeks to monitor phytoplankton, the main culprits in harmful algal blooms around the Gulf coast.

Leadership event includes international component

GMF Youth Leadership in Stewardship Conference

SSCN members from Penuelas, Puerto Rico, present their science investigation of wind and wave currents that connect the Caribbean to the
Gulf of Mexico. Javier Gonzalez,(far left) science teacher, addresses the
Leadership Conference assembly with his students seated at the table.
May 2008 - Eleven GMF Science & Spanish Clubs and more than 150 students, faculty, presenters and exhibitors converged on the Sinton High School campus to discuss special coastal issues during the 4^th Annual Gulf of Mexico Youth Leadership in Stewardship Conference held on May 10. The GMF SSCN club from Penuelas, Puerto Rico, sent a delegation of three students along with a faculty sponsor to the event. A video conference hook-up was established between the conference site and St. Croix Central High School, USVI, setting the stage for further connection between the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean. The event was sponsored by the Gulf of Mexico Foundation’s Science & Spanish Club Network (SSCN), BP America, Port of Corpus Christi and Oceaneering.

Students celebrate earth and water on Earth Day

SSCN members share the stage with city officials in a ceremony
commemorating a pipeline that supplies water to the Coastal Bend.
April 2008 - More than 160 student members of the GMF's Science & Spanish Club Network (SSCN) participated in the 9th Annual Earth Day Bay Day Celebration on April 19 at Cole Park in Corpus Christi which attracted over 15,000 people -- the largest event to date. Inside the GMF's tent, students from the SSCN operated eco-games they had created including Gulf Coast Twister, the Redfish Bay Ring Toss and Bird Bingo. SSCN members from Aransas Pass, Ingleside, Sinton, Port Lavaca and Edna attended the event. Also at the Earth Day event, all club members participated in a ceremony to commemorate the 15th anniversary of construction of the Mary Rhodes Pipeline, a humanized watershed that runs from Lake Texana in Jackson County, through the 105-mile-long manmade pipeline, to supply water to Corpus Christi and other Coastal Bend communities. It's the water that their families and friends drink and use on a daily basis. In the ceremony, club members were joined by representatives from the San Patricio Municipal Water District, the City of Corpus Christi Water Department, City Councilwoman Nelda Martinez and Tara Rhodes (granddaughter of Mary Rhodes who was a former mayor of the City of Corpus Christi). The commemoration was a coastal environmental project sponsored by Valero, South Texas Dairy Queen and a Texas General Land Office Coastal Management Program Cycle 12 grant.

Clubs march in parade, clean beach, restore marsh
Feb 2008 - GMF SSCN clubs from the Texas Coastal Bend kicked off Ecology = Economy week with the 3^rd Annual Redfish Bay Trash Parade & Coastal Cleanup on February 16. The parade began in Ingleside and reconvened with another parade through downtown Aransas Pass. After the parade, some clubs participated in the Texas General Land Office's Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at the Lighthouse Lakes Trail Park along Redfish Bay Causeway while others went to Goose Island State Park to transplant marsh grasses as part of a habitat restoration project.

GMF SSCN creates first Ecology = Economy Week
Feb 2008 - The first Aransas/San Patricio County Economy = Ecology Week held Feb 16-23 featured a Trash Parade, Redfish Bay Cleanup, Goose Island Marsh Restoration and Obligation Day. The event was organized by the GMF and sponsored by Texas Transportation Institute, Valero, Cheniere LNG, San Patricio Economic Development Commission, Coastal Bend Bays Foundation, Texas Parks & Wildlife, Dairy Queen of South Texas, and the Texas General Land Office’s Coastal Management Program. The economy side of the Economy = Ecology formula featured an Obligation Day on Feb 19 at the Aransas Pass High School gymnasium where students learned about coastal workforce training, education and employment choices available where they live. Obligation Day featured several local and regional employers including South Texas Nuclear Power, Texas Department of Transportation, Shiner Moseley Engineering, Texas Parks & Wildlife, the US Navy and TAMU-CC Nursing School. "These companies are looking to recruit workers now and in the near-future, said Richard Gonzales, GMF's SSCN Project Coordinator. For that reason, we invited community leaders from chambers of commerce, city councils, school boards and other community groups to meet with the exhibiting companies during a Community Bleacher Lunch sponsored by Cheniere LNG,” Gonzales said.

Palacios clubs create 'river dragon' for parade
Redfish Bay Trash Parade 2008

Feb 2008 - GMF SSCN clubs from Van Vleck and Palacios marched in the 60^th Annual Harmony Club Valentine's Parade in Palacios, Texas, on Feb 9. To carry in the parade, students and faculty helped to design and make a "river dragon" made of sheer fabric to represent the watershed approach to coastal environmental stewardship and upstream-midstream-downstream community-based cooperation.

Message-in-a-bottle experiments teach students
Message in a Bottle found 2007 on Matagorda

Jan 2008 - GMF SSCN clubs from Texas learned about scientific experiments conducted by students from two schools which are faraway but which lie near the Gulf Stream. Science students from schools in New York and Puerto Rico put messages in bottles and released them into the Gulf Stream to see where the bottles would land. A school from Long Island, New York launched a message in a bottle in 1999 which was found on Matagorda Beach in Texas in 2007 (see photo at right). A school from the island of Puerto Rico launched 84 bottles in November 2006 off the southern coast of the island and bottle #13 was found by volunteers at the Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup in April 2007. SSCN members are studying message-in-a-bottle experiments using real-time sensors to track the natural movement of the bottles via satellite.

Clubs tour lakes, learn first hand about watersheds
Dec 2007 - Science & Spanish Clubs from Aransas Pass, Ingleside and Sinton explored the man-made lakes at Lake Texana in Jackson County and the 7,000-acre lake that supplies water to the South Texas Nuclear Power Plant near Bay City, Texas. These field trips helped to show how people influence natural watersheds. Next these students will connect with the Science & Spanish Club in Edna, Texas, to explore the Mary Rhodes Pipeline, a humanized watershed that brings fresh water from Lake Texana to Corpus Christi 120 miles to the south. Corpus Christi then redistributes the water to several Coastal Bend communities.

South Texas clubs participate in trash clean-up
Nov 2007 - Science & Spanish Clubs from Port Isabel and Brownsville joined hundreds of other volunteers in the 3^rd Annual Bahia Grande/Laguna Madre Coastal Cleanup on Nov 10. The event was organized by Cameron County Parks & Recreation, the City of Port Isabel, the Port Isabel Economic Development Commission and Red River Services. Nearly three tons of trash were picked up in several trash hot spots around the Bahia Grande and Laguna Madre.

Coastal Bend clubs clean up, learn at Matagorda
Sept 2007 - More than 180 members of the Science & Spanish Club Network helped to boost the largest volunteer turnout (300) ever for the Texas General Land Office Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at Matagorda Beach held on September 22. Students from Tidehaven, Edna, Bay City, Port Lavaca, El Campo and Palacios joined more than 100 other community volunteers as hundreds of bags of beach debris was picked up. "The Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup experience teaches youth leadership by example skills by learning how to take the initiative in picking up other people’s trash,” explained S&S Club Network coordinator Richard Gonzales. “Students are also introduced to the scientific method as they record the types of shoreline trash picked up. Data is collected on data cards provided by the Ocean Conservancy who have been organizing a global beach cleanup effort for over 30 years now. Students come to understand that trash is a global problem that will be solved only through local communities taking responsibility for their part of the coastline,” he said.

Science & Spanish Clubs from El Campo, Palacios, Tidehaven, Edna, Port Lavaca and Bay City joined other volunteers at the Texas General Land Office Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup held on Sept 22 on Matagorda Island, Texas.

Tidehaven Sand Erosion team - click to enlarge

Science & Spanish Club students from Tidehaven, Texas, assemble in front of the Lower Colorado River Authority Nature Learning Center as they prepare to measure sand dune erosion along Matagorda Beach as part of their Adopt-A-Beach cleanup experience on Sept 22.

Edna S&S Club at Matagorda - click to enlarge

Science & Spanish Club students from Edna, Texas, take a break from their volunteer work at the Texas General Land Office Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup on Matagorda Sept 22.

Clubs clean up Lighthouse Lakes Park, more
Lighthouse Lakes Trash Pick-Up

Sept 2007 - More than 130 members of the Science & Spanish Club Network helped to boost the largest volunteer turnout (160) ever for the Texas General Land Office Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at the Lighthouse Lakes Park, Conn Brown Harbor and the Aransas Pass Aquatics Center held on September 22. Science & Spanish Clubs from Sinton, Ingleside, Corpus Christi and Aransas Pass joined over 30 other community volunteers as 300 hundred bags of beach debris were picked up.

3M Corporation presents check to S&S Club

Photo by Diana Gonzales - click to enlarge

May 2007 - 3M Corporation-Brownwood surprised the GMF’s Science & Spanish Club Network middle-school students at the 2007 Texas Environmental Excellence (TEE) Awards on May 7 by presenting them with a check for $2,500 for the work they have done to promote a healthy environment in the Gulf of Mexico region. The bilingual science education project has expanded to include students in coastal zone communities from Texas to Mexico. At the TEE awards ceremony, the GMF’s S&S Club Network received the award in the Youth category. "It was a day the kids will not forget," said GMF Executive Director Dr. Quenton Dokken about the award, adding, "And, the grant from 3M Corporation was more icing on the cake. Many of the kids come from disadvantage backgrounds and the check from 3M was mind boggling! When I last saw them after the event, they were walking down the hall carrying the oversized check mock up. It was a gold medal in their eyes. I have no idea how they packed it into their van." At the same banquet, 3M Corporation-Brownwood received the award in the Large Business/Technical category for its innovative methods that helped to reduce volatile organic compound emissions, to reduce waste and to improve energy efficiency. The GMF congratulates 3M Brownwood for its award, and appreciates its financial support of the GMF S&S Club Network.

S&S Club organizes two-town Trash Parade

Photos by Carrie Robertson - click to enlarge
Feb 2007 - GMF Science & Spanish Club members from five schools in the Texas

Coastal Bend area joined together to march for a cleaner environment during the 2^nd Annual Redfish Bay Trash Parade on Saturday morning, Feb 17. Dressed in matching parade T-shirts, the students first marched in Ingleside, then got back in school buses and rode to Aransas Pass, where they marched again. In both parades, they carried themed banners, posters and flags, and shouted slogans such as "Pick up your trash," and "Please don't litter." The event was part of the annual Winter Beach Cleanup sponsored by the Texas General Land Office. "The students have leaned that they share a common ecosystem that is Redfish Bay with its vast sensitive seagrass pasture," said Richard Gonzales, project coordinator, adding, "Marine debris, whether it comes from land, rivers, bays or the gulf, is caused mostly by human behavior."