CORPUS CHRISTI, Texas (AP) — Capt. Rod Spivey idles his skiff loaded with science equipment and middle school science students toward what will be their offshore classroom for the next hour.
As the boat’s bow closes in on the sturdy wooden platform in Redfish Bay Spivey begins to bark out docking instructions to his young charges from the Science & Spanish Club Network at Sterling B. Martin Special Emphasis Middle School. He had their attention.
That is until a large mullet stole it away by leaping out of the bay, bouncing off the bow deck and doing a belly flop onto the main deck, where it separated the students like a rattlesnake in a crowd.
“That there is a striped mullet,” Spivey proclaimed, barely skipping a beat. “Somebody pick it up and put it back into the bay. Hurry up before it dies.”
During this brief summer outing, the students would enjoy a preview of a project aimed at helping them understanding and care for the coastal ecosystem where they live. The mullet was a bonus.
The Gulf of Mexico Foundation’s Science and Spanish Club Network, which was founded more than a decade ago, is an extracurricular environmental education program with a multicultural element, explained network coordinator Richard Gonzales, who maintains a relationship with participating schools on both sides of the U.S.-Mexico border.
The program mostly involves middle school students in Corpus Christi, Aransas Pass and Ingleside. Nearly 600 Coastal Bend students are connected to the club, Gonzales said.
Funding comes from the Texas General Land Office, the Environmental Protection Agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the Gulf of Mexico Foundation. Local clubs have received grants or in-kind help from Cheniere Energy, Archer-Daniels-Midland, the Port of Corpus Christi, the Artificial Reef Foundation, the Conrad Blucher Institute for Surveying and Science at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi, club fundraisers and donations from individuals. The organization is pursuing nonprofit status, Gonzales said.
Most club field trips are scheduled on weekends, where Royce Avery, superintendent of the Aransas Pass school district said club members develop research, technological and analytical tools that translate well into the classroom. These students work with biological and atmospheric equipment, distance learning technology, real-time web-based monitoring and video monitoring.
Teachers agree.
Veteran science teacher Robin Flores, who has been involved with the Science & Spanish Club for more than 10 years, said the program doesn’t just attract inquisitive students thirsty for science.
“Even marginal students in the club get exciting and want to do more,” said Flores, who teaches at Blaschke-Sheldon Elementary School in Ingleside. “Their overall ability to communicate with other students improves. And we’ve seen several students go on to study marine biology or chemical engineering and some have even become teachers.”
Flores, a faculty sponsor of the club, said she’s seen reading levels improve along with test scores and critical thinking skills.
The club’s broad focus is the Gulf of Mexico and all its watersheds. Gonzales said the aim is to foster local, regional and international relationships with other coastal students. The club’s activities and research targets shorelines, watersheds and water bodies.
Beach cleanups, upstream visits and bay research rounds out the emphasis during the school year. This latest teaching tool in Redfish Bay involves a partnership with The Conrad Blucher Institute for Surveying and Science at Texas A&M University-Corpus Christi.
The institute is helping to outfit the Redfish Bay Research Station with devices that measure and record wind speed, water temperature, water level, salinity and other data. This is a real-time monitoring system that students everywhere will be able to access and chart by computer, Gonzales said.
Spivey, a network volunteer with the fledgling Artificial Reef Foundation, plans to improve the Redfish Bay station to include a sheltered work station and permanent seating for visiting students and teachers. Part of the goal here is to teach students about the role of seagrass in the coastal ecosystem.
That’s why the research station is within the 32,000-acre Redfish Bay State Scientific Area, which is the only seagrass protection zone in Texas. It is illegal to uproot seagrass within this shallow zone with an outboard propeller.
Nearby Charlie Marshall Elementary School in Aransas Pass became the first Seagrass Savvy School of the club network. Blaschke-Sheldon Elementary School in Ingleside and the Fulton Learning Center in Aransas County are scheduled to be next.
Ultimately, Gonzales hopes many Coastal Bend campuses participate with coastal schools in Louisiana, Florida, Alabama, along with students in Mexico and beyond, wherever freshwater meets saltwater.
Other campuses in the network include A.C. Blunt Middle School and Aransas Pass High School. In Mexico, the sole participant is Colegio Juvenal Rendon in Matamoros. Students from the Matamoros school visited Corpus Christi in 1995 for an Environmental Protection Agency Gulf of Mexico Symposium on the Lexington Museum on the Bay.
The Science and Spanish Club Network was born in 2000 when students from Mexico returned to Corpus Christi for their ninth-grade trip and forged a relationship with Cunningham Middle School.
“I realized the students could connect on the basis of a shared ecosystem,” Gonzales said. “It turned out to be an environmental education framework that really does work.”
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Information from: Corpus Christi Caller-Times, http://www.caller.com
