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The project brought together a number of key participants to address the demand for information on health issues, which has grown exponentially. To address this demand, Eastern Charlotte Waterways Inc., an environmental resource center, Environment Canada and the New Brunswick Lung Association initiated a school program with the cooperation of several schools from the coastal regions as well as inland watershed areas of New Brunswick.
Young children breathe more rapidly and inhale more pollutants per kilogram of body weight than adults and they spend more time involved in vigorous outdoor activities. Children also have a higher prevalence of asthma than adults. Asthmatic children appear more sensitive to air pollutants such as ozone. Many of these children are exposed to higher than average levels of ground level ozone as a result of living adjacent to high-density traffic corridors and interchanges, and jet stream corridors. This is of particular concern for Atlantic Canadians since Environment Canada records for the year 2000 verify that Aylesford, Nova Scotia, recorded the highest average ground-level ozone values in Canada.This issue must be addressed through research and education.
An air quality awareness and data collection program was established in participating schools. The participation of educators, parents, industry and agencies ensured an integrated educative study that allowed the need for information and technology materials to be addressed within schools and communities. Students were given the ability to become the catalyts for providing information to community in regards to health and air quality links. The data collected, correlated and disseminated as a result of the program were and will continue to be shared through a number media, which include the World Wide Web, community and event presentations, local media and, most importantly, personal community exchange.
The Air for Health Education Program commenced later than anticipated due to the events of 9/11. Scheduled to begin in September 2001, the project monitoring could not get started until April 2002. Previous to the commencement of the monitoring component, a committee was formed to lead the project. The committee was composed of three educators, three watershed groups, three community volunteers and one environmental agency representative. This project team was established to oversee the focus and expected results of the program were maintained.
Educators from the elementary and middle schools began to prepare their students for the project by allowing ECW to present information relevant to climate change and engage the students in early research. Students in the elementary schools who had been supplied with weather watcher capabilities went forward with their component of the project and had begun to indicate weather conditions in late fall 2001. This information has not been included in the final results but allowed the younger students to feel engaged.
Once EcoBadges and monitoring equipment had been received, and parents and educators permitted its use, the project team distributed the equipment to other areas of the study to be monitored. We were fortunate to have a group from the Gulf of Maine Expedition volunteer to acquire EcoBadge data from along the coastal zone of the New England states over an extended period, commencing May of 2002. This data proved to be very beneficial to the overall study.
The Clean Annapolis River Project in Nova Scotia (the area of the highest concentrations of ground level ozone in Canada) was provided with 600 EcoBadges and monitoring equipment to commence monitoring with that community in 2002, as was ACAP Saint John, an environmental group located in an industrialized city in southern New Brunswick.
Finally in April, a rocky start had been overcome and the communities were engaged in monitoring efforts and the compilation of data relative to air quality issues. By the end of May 2002, initial monitoring had been established so that students who were to represent New Brunswick in the Summer Institute in New Hampshire in July of 2002 were able to commence the production of their presentation to students, educators and volunteers from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Maine, Nova Scotia and, of course, New Brunswick.
Monitoring continued over the summer months (June–September) due to the late start in 2002 rather than in September 2001. Community volunteers, youth and watershed groups conducted this monitoring. This proved to be advantageous to the program, considering it is at this time that the highest levels of ground-level ozone were detected. Had we proceeded with our original monitoring schedule, the data showing these elevated levels would not have been available.
Once students engaged in the program returned to the classrooms in September 2002, the project team began to assist them in the process of compiling the data collected over the summer with what the students had found earlier in the program. Younger students were provided with the new information in the classroom and the playground and the middle school students began the task of integrating all the data accomplished into one database. To accomplish this, an environmental science class was asked to set up a database that would compile all the data. Students then found that there were gaps in the weather monitoring over the extended summer period. To address this, they were provided with a contact at the Environment office who assisted them with the correlative data.
A final meeting of the project team was held on 21 November 2002, to discuss the final project, assess the deliverables and determine next steps. There was general consensus that students needed to be further engaged in a hands-on manner in the issue of air quality and climate change and that they must be given the opportunity to be heard and to make changes in their communities. In fact, it was strongly felt that they were the only ones that could. Based on those discussions a proposal was submitted to the Climate Change Fund to provide dollars for Community Youth against Climate Change." Funds of C$14,000 were granted in January of 2003 for students to:
- Develop a series of youth-designed local paper advertisements addressing climate change and health risks and outlining the actions youth want to see their communities take to reduce detrimental affects.
- Conduct a community workshop and science fair directed at air quality, health and climate change.
- Conduct a televised panel discussion between youth and political representatives to address their concerns related to climate change and affects on their communities.
The final program results will be established on our web site <www.ecwinc.org> by 31 March 2004.
Here are some of the statements made by the students at the end of the project:
- Schools should not be in downtown areas where there is lots of traffic."
- Lots of trees should be planted where we live and play to make our air cleaner."
- Governments shouldn't let people poison us."
- Classrooms and schoolyards should have fulltime monitoring for harmful pollutants."
- People shouldn't drive their cars all the time—take a bus or ask for a ride."
- Better vehicles need to be available and large ones should be taxed or fined somehow for polluting the air."
- Stop big mills from polluting the air."
Eastern Charlotte Waterways Inc.
St. George, New Brunswick, Canada
For more information about this grant, please contact the CEC Secretariat.
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