A WATERSHED OF TREES, PRINCE GEORGE’S COUNTY PUBLIC SCHOOLS, MD: STUDENT DATA COLLECTION IN SUPPORT OF CLIMATE ACTION AND ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE

Environmental science students in Prince George’s County Public Schools, MD are engaged in hands-on data collection and analysis, throughout the school year, at each of the 28 high schools in the district. Students record the humidity and temperature of the atmosphere, land surface temperatures, and subsurface soil temperatures at paired study sites on their school grounds in order to create a district-wide climate baseline for the county. At each school students have selected a pair of sample sites, one open, one shaded, that they will monitor throughout the school year.

Students are working outdoors in their own community, to observe, record, monitor, and build understanding of the importance of climate on the quality of life in their neighborhoods, and to empower them to act on that understanding. The paired sites at each school provide data to assess the impact of shade trees on local microclimates across diverse county ecosystems, from urban to agricultural. The presence or absence of trees impacts water movement and quality, ambient temperature, habitat, and air quality. Student understanding of the role of trees in the environment encourages meaningful community actions – such as tree planting – that have a significant effect on building resilience to climate change and reducing social inequity.

Student data collection is embedded in the context of climate action plans for both the county and the school system. The county CAP calls for mapping urban heat islands and indexing these locations with equity data to ensure protection of the most vulnerable populations from climate change impacts. The CAP addresses the need for climate education, calling for the development of programs that build climate literacy into existing and new curricula, seeking to include climate change impacts as the central focus. By engaging high school students as essential contributors to the Climate Action Plan PGCPS centers the county’s youth in the design and implementation of mitigation and resilience strategies in response to global climate change.