THE OWASCO LAKE BUOY PROJECT: INTRODUCING HIGH SCHOOL STUDENTS TO WATER QUALITY MONITORING OF OWASCO AND SENECA LAKES

Project Based Learning (PBL) is critical to foster scientific literacy in high schools. These learning modules focus on the water quality of two mesotrophic Finger Lakes in central New York using data from monitoring buoys. Both Owasco and Seneca Lakes supply Class AA drinking water to local communities and support an agriculturally-rich, tourism-based economy. Working in partnership with local high school science teachers, these curriculum modules explore the principles and trends in lake water quality across the April-October monitoring season.

Both water quality monitoring buoys are programmed to collect water column profiles of temperature, salinity (specific conductance), dissolved oxygen, turbidity (light backscattering), total and blue green algae (fluorescence) concentrations every 12 hours. The buoys also measure air temperature, barometric pressure, light intensity, relative humidity, and wind speed and direction every hour at the deployment site. The buoys then periodically transfer the data by cellular technologies to an internet server at Hobart and William Smith Colleges for near real-time display of the data in graphical and numerical formats including a searchable internet database. http://fli-data.hws.edu/buoy/owasco/ & http://fli-data.hws.edu/buoy/seneca/

In recent years, the water quality of Owasco Lake has declined that has recently included harmful algal blooms during the late summer. Local science teachers have been focusing portions of their instruction on studying Owasco Lake and its watershed to raise student awareness about the link between human disturbance, land use and water quality issues. Prior to this project, access to authentic water quality investigations had been limited to stream monitoring of Owasco Lake tributaries. The Owasco Lake Buoy project provides teachers, and their students, access to near real-time water quality data of the lake itself.

The Owasco Lake Buoy project has been an exciting partnership between the K-12 and higher education communities to develop much-need curriculum that addresses local water quality issues, introduces students to authentic scientific data and fosters the development of 21^st century skills for college and career readiness.