Title
Point Source Pollution: Cause, Effect, and Treatment

Subject/Content Area
Science/Environmental Science/Science and Society/Pollution

Purpose/Goal
Students will discuss pollution and point-source pollution for a brief period of time and then utilize computer skills and the Internet to do further research on a specific pollutant, its reasons, causes, effects, and treatment possibilities. This research will include web searches as well as communication with experts in the field. Upon completion of the research, the students will collaborate in teams of 2-3 to construct a presentation to be presented to the entire class.

Context/Setting/Environment
This project demonstrates some elements of National Science:

Teaching Standards A, B, C, D, E, F
Assessment Standards A, B, C, D, E;
Content Standards A, B, C, D, E, F, G, with special emphasis on F; and
Program Standards A, B, C, D, E, F.

The following new Illinois State Goals have some elements addressed:

11: B.5a, B.5e, C.5a, C.5e, C.5f, D.5a, and D.5b;
12: A.5a, A.5b, A.5c, B.5a, C.5a, D.5b; and
13: A.5a, A.5b, B.5, C.5a, and C.5b.

The project is designed as an integral part of Geneva Community School District #304's Science program, Environmental Science course, and therefore fullfills part of the goals for that course. It also fits within the district's technology plan as regards student access and utilization of technology.

Time Frame for Carrying Out Project
The project will take place within the Environmental Science unit on The Effect of Human Activity on the Environment: Pollution. This section of the course will occur approximately half-way through Students will spend 30-55 minutes in discussion, both precedent and antecedent to the Internet activity, 220 minutes (4 class periods) on the Internet, with more time available both before and after school, at the student's option. Presentations will have the suggested length of 15 minutes, but students will have a great deal of flexibility regarding the length of their presentation. Class size and number of teams affect the time frame for presentations as well. Therefore, the time frame for the presentations is projected at 220 minutes (4 class periods).

Learner Description
The students in the Environmental Science class at Geneva High School consist of juniors and seniors. They are taking the class as an elective, after completing at least two other science courses. They come from middle or upper-middle income families and are assumed to be highly motivated and interested in science.

Learner Outcomes
At the end of this project, students will demonstrate that they understand and are able to:

·acquire basic conceptual and factual knowledge concerning pollution,
·utilize the internet to conduct research, download information, and communicate with individuals at various websites, and
·evaluate, organize, and present what they have learned.

Project Description
See the student home page.

Assessment of Students involved in the project
The project will be assessed through teacher critique and evaluation of the research phase as well as a short quiz. Components of the group work habits (IV), group dynamics (V), and presentation (VI) rubrics from the Northwestern University Covis Project will be used. In addition, information will be gathered by the teacher and all students during each presentation and that information used to construct a brief knowledge and application based quiz.

Evaluation of Project
Teacher and students will answer and discuss the following three questions:
What worked?
What didn't?
What would we change?

Annotated Bibliography

The Point Source Pollution link from the top of the page has the URL http://moby.ucdavis.edu/GAWS/161/2bravo/1.htm and offers a discussion of point source pollution as well as many examples.

The students have been provided with the following links:

Santa Barbara Pollution Resources has a wide variety of pollution information available. URL is http://www.webdirectory.com/Pollution/
Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality has information concerning air quality and radiation protection, solid and hazardous waste, and water quality. URL is http://www.deq.state.la.us/
Role of Scientific Information in Policy and Decision Making is a paper examing how science influences the public in their decision-making process. URL is http://www.ire.ubc.ca/ecoresearch/publica2.html
Interesting Pollution Remediation Methods examines possibilities in cleaning up and/or elimination pollutants from polluted areas. URL is http://www.engg.ksu.edu/HSRC/Annual.Research.html
Greenpeace is an independent, campaigning organisation which uses non-violent, creative confrontation to expose global environmental problems, and to force the solutions which are essential to a green and peaceful future. They are an antagonistic, no-nonsense group, but they have a wide variety of useful information. URL is http://www.greenpeace.org/
Envirolink says this about themselves: "EnviroLink is the largest online environmental information resource on the planet. EnviroLink is a non-profit organization...a grassroots online community that unites hundreds of organizations and volunteers around the world with millions of people in over 130 countries." URL is http://www.envirolink.org/
America's Clean Water: Louisiana's Progress since 1972 takes a look at the Clean Water Act, and how Louisiana has used it to clean up their water resources over the past 25 years or so. Even though this is focused on Louisiana, the information can be generalized to any area. This area has a lot of general information regarding non-point source and point source pollution also. URL is http://www.deq.state.la.us/asiwpca/st%26trds.htm#pt14
Impairment of Rock Creek in Idaho (URL is http://h2osparc.wq.ncsu.edu/info/idaho/wqimpair.html) is a brief treatment of what happened to this creek as it became polluted. For more insight into impairment of water, including other material such as more definitions of PSP and NPSP, including a study of Nomini Creek, the Chesapeake Bay ( URL is http://rcwpsun.cas.psu.edu/ncsu/casestudies/chesapeake/chesimpair.html) study is good. This one also has many more useful links embedded within it.
If you'd really like to read an excellent paper on point source pollution, check out this link. URL is http://h2osparc.wq.ncsu.edu/estuary/rec/pointsrc.html
For a primer on pollution that includes a comparison between point source and non-point source pollution, you might want to spend some time here. URL is http://www.ag.ohio-state.edu/~ohioline/aex-fact/465.html
Ozone Secretariat is based in Vienna and provides information concerning status and depletion of the ozone layer in our atmosphere. URL is http://www.unep.no/unep/secretar/ozone/
For a review of what ozone is and the impacts of its depletion, this is a good source of general information. URL is http://gcrio.gcrio.org:8080/CONSEQUENCES/summer95/impacts.html
To see a specific example of point source pollution including the manure problem, the National Pork Producers have an interesting site to visit. URL is http://www.nppc.org/EnvironmentalSection/environ-regulatory-review.html
The Great Lakes Environmental Information System ( URL is http://epawww.ciesin.org/) has a wide variety of information available including pollution in the Fox River in Wisconsin (http://epaserver.ciesin.org:7777/glreis/nonpo/nprog/aoc_rap/docs/AOCSEDwisconsin.html) and a study of Waukegan Harbor (http://epaserver.ciesin.org:7777/glreis/nonpo/nprog/aoc_rap/docs/AOCSEDillinois.html) in this area.
A very specific treatment of how pollutants enter waterways, such as the Ohio River, is available at this site. URL is http://www.orsanco.org/watrqual.html
The Environmental Directory has tons of addresses and links that will help your research. URL is
http://www.lib.kth.se/~lg/envsite.htm

It is assumed that students will access additional links during the research phase of the project.



Author: Scott R. Bevans, SRBevans@AOL.com
Created: July 17, 1996 - Updated: July 18, 1966

Written for the The Fermilab LInC program sponsored by the Fermilab Education Office