Tougher environmental laws and concern for students are prompting many schools to consider new ways of teaching chemistry and other sciences. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tom Rogers reports:
Transcript
Tougher environmental laws and concern for students are prompting many schools to consider
new ways of teaching chemistry and other sciences. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Tom
Rogers reports:
Teachers in Illinois are being introduced to what’s being called “green chemistry” – using much
smaller amounts of hazardous chemicals – or none at all – to conduct experiments for
demonstration.
Bill Nelson is a chemical process specialist with the University of Illinois. He says not only is
green chemistry safer for students, it won’t leave behind a legacy of chemicals needing disposal.
Nelson says there’s no reason to worry that students won’t get the full impact of working with
larger supplies of chemicals.
“Students will be taught a healthy respect for chemicals, but what we’re trying to do is limit the
chemicals that are used in the classroom laboratories to as minimal as possible so that down the
road we don’t face the difficulties oftentimes we face now with disposal.”
Nelson says one prime example is mercury – it was widely used in classrooms until it was linked
to a variety of illnesses. Now schools are trying to roundup old mercury supplies and dispose of
them properly.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Tom Rogers.
American Electric Power is buying a village in the Midwest for 20 million dollars. The people who live in the Ohio River village of Cheshire agreed to sell their homes and businesses so they can get away from emissions from AEP’s largest coal-burning power plant in Ohio. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Natalie Walston reports:
Transcript
American Electric Power is buying a village in the Midwest for 20 million
dollars. The people who live in the Ohio River village of Cheshire agreed to
sell their homes and businesses so they can get away from emissions from
AEP’s largest coal-burning power plant in Ohio. The Great Lakes Radio
Consortium’s Natalie Walston reports:
Chuck Reynolds bought a house with a large front porch in the village of
Cheshire three years ago. The house is on the banks of the Ohio River.
And his bait shop is next door.
But, by next year, both his house and business will be gone.
“This was gonna be our retirement home. I mean, we planned on staying here
the rest of our lives. We’ve got a beautiful view of the river. We’ve got a
boat dock and of course a boat. And, uh, the business is right next door. Everything’s kind of falling into place for us.”
Reynolds is one of 220 Cheshire residents who have agreed to sell their properties to AEP. For decades people here have complained about the emissions from AEP’s General James M. Gavin plant nearby.
But some people in Cheshire recently threatened to sue AEP after blue clouds of sulfuric acid from the plant’s smoke stacks blanketed the village on humid days last summer. Villagers complained of stinging eyes and sore throats from the clouds.
Ironically, those clouds were created by new equipment that was installed to cut down on smog-causing pollutants that drift to the East Coast. AEP spokesman Tom Ayres says the company has spent millions of dollars to try and stop the sulfuric acid emissions from recurring this summer.
And with that kind of investment … it wasn’t AEP’s idea to buy the community.
“Representatives of the village approached us and we had been in conversations with them on a regular basis since we’d experienced these operating problems last summer. And, um, as I say, over, you know, a course of negotiations this was a solution that was arrived at and sought by, um, you know, representatives of the village.”
Representatives of the village include environmental groups, such as the Buckeye Environmental Council. Theresa Mills speaks for the group. She calls the settlement a victory.
“This village has experienced many, many problems for many years with this plant and they wanted out. And … they got what they wanted. So, in that respect, it is a victory for them.”
While the residents of Cheshire are getting out … school children from the rest of the county aren’t so lucky. There are still two Gallia county schools that remain open within 600 yards of the Gavin plant. Mills says she would like to see the school district sue the Ohio and U.S. EPA for allowing the air to be polluted.
Meanwhile, AEP has plans to expand its Gavin plant once the people move out of Cheshire.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Natalie Walston.
Great Lakes residents use more than two million tires a year, and many of them end up in a landfill. But one Illinois school has found an unusual way to use some of those tires. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman has more:
Transcript
Great Lakes residents use more than two million tires a year, and many of them end up in a landfill. But one Illinois school has found an unusual way to use some of those tires. And they’re saving on hospital costs as well. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Chris Lehman has more.
(natural sound football practice, fade under quickly)
From beer cans to soda bottles, there are plenty of items that can be recycled at a typical football game. But at the 31-thousand seat Huskie Stadium at Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois, what is perhaps the largest recycling effort is in the field itself. More than 18-thousand ground-up tires are underneath the new surface of the playing field . . .mixed with sand; they provide a soft but durable base for all types of athletic events. The fake grass on top is similar to Astroturf, but project manager Norm Jenkins says this surface is better. He says the most important advantage is safety.
“It’s well documented over the last few years since these fields have been installed that the injury frequency goes way down in terms of ankle and knee injuries on this surface as opposed to the old Astroturf carpet. So it really simulates grass in that way. The other big advantage to this in our judgment is the appearance. Because really, as you sit in the stands at a Huskie football game–and even from the sidelines when you stand on that stuff–you’re convinced that the surface is grass. It looks, it appears just like a pristine grass playing surface”
The artificial turf at NIU is a brand called Field Turf. Jim Petrucelli is Vice-President of Turf USA, a Pittsburgh-based distributor of Field Turf. He says the scrap tires for the product are first washed with a high-pressure cleaning system similar to a car wash. But the tires aren’t run through grinder blades. That process is called ambient grinding because it takes place at room temperature. It tends to produce longer, rougher particles.
Instead, Petrucelli says the company cryogenically freezes the tires to temperatures below negative 80 degrees Fahrenheit.
“And then they drop them onto a hammer-mill. And the hammer-mill shatters them into pieces. And those pieces tend to have much flatter sides on them . . . that works much better in our system to prevent the rubber from migrating through the sand that it’s mixed with.”
Field Turf is used at several universities in the Great Lakes region, including the University of Cincinnati, Bucknell University in Pennsylvania, and at a University of Michigan field house. It’s also in use at dozens of high schools and public recreation facilities across the region, and has been installed in places as far away as Botswana and New Zealand.
Petrucelli says that at more than eight dollars a square foot, Field Turf is the Cadillac of artificial turf products. At Northern Illinois University, nearly one-third of the cost of installing the Field Turf was recovered through a variety of money-saving measures. The largest of these was a 200-thousand dollar grant from the Illinois Department of Commerce and Community Affairs. The money was awarded to the school for its use of the tires, which came from a salvage yard near Chicago. Robert Albanese is NIU’s Associate Vice President of Finance and Facilities.
“Every time you purchase a new tire there’s a fee that goes along with it. It goes to this fund for recycling the tires. And this process will only work, is if we use those recycled materials on the other end. And this is probably one of the bigger uses for recycled rubber that we’ve seen in the state of Illinois.”
NIU Director of Recycling Mary Crocker says the use of old tires in the Field Turf project wasn’t just about saving money.
“We’re interested in keeping the tires out the landfills. So this is probably the most comprehensive recycling program that you can find, where virtually everything has to do with recycling.”
(More football sound under)
The old Astroturf, which was removed to make way for the Field Turf, was also recycled. The university sold it for use as a soccer field overseas, earning an additional 29 thousand dollars for the school. For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Chris Lehman.
For years, people have grappled with the age-old question: Which
came first, the chicken or the egg? Of course, there’s no definitive
answer. But as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson
reports, at one elementary school, the chickens always come first:
According to the world health organization, up to twelve-million cases
of head lice are reported each year. School-aged children, between
three and ten, are most likely to get lice. At most schools, kids with
lice are sent home, where the parents are left to deal with the
problem. But as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson
reports, some lice-fighting experts are trying a new, pro-active
approach:
Transcript
According to the world health organization, up to twelve-million cases of
head lice are reported each year.
School-aged children, between three and ten, are most likely to get lice.
At most schools, kids with lice are sent home, where the parents are left to
deal with the problem.
But as the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson reports, some
lice-fighting experts are trying a new, pro-active approach:
(sound of hallway)
Beach Elementary School in Cedar Springs, Michigan, looks like pretty much
like any other elementary school.
The linoleum floors are buffed to a high shine,
and the walls are decorated with crayon drawings.
But when you look down the hallways, you’ll see a strange sight: hundreds of
black, plastic trash bags hanging from the coat hooks.
“When the kids come in, they put all of their personal belongings –
coats, hats, gloves – in the-plastic bags. That’s how their clothing is
contained so that the bugs don’t have the opportunity to crawl.”
Vicky Bishop says more and more schools are using garbage bags this way –
when you see them, it’s a reminder of the ongoing struggle they face, trying
to eliminate lice.
Experts say about eighty-percent of school districts will have a lice
outbreak this year. At this school, the trash bags are a pro-active measure,
taken to cut down on the chance that an infestation will break out.
And, there’s another pro-active step the school’s taking.
On this Saturday morning, they’ve invited families from all over the
community to a special kind of open house – a chance to get de-loused.
Nurse: “Ok, are we checking all three?”
Mom: “Everybody.”
Nurse: “Everybody! Ok!”
Families are greeted at a sign-up table. Then they’re guided through a
series of rooms, where teams of lice-fighting experts are standing by to
shampoo and comb and look for lice.
The first stop is the evaluation station.
Every family member’s head is careful checked for live lice or their eggs,
called nits.
Nurse: “And the big key is to make the difference between dandruff and the
nits. The nits won’t come off, dandruff can move – see, I can easily move
it. Okay, sweetie.”
The event is called Operation Lice Be Gone.
It’s the brainchild of lice consultant Vicky Bishop.
Bishop travels around the country, visiting dozens of schools a year and
advising teachers, nurses and parents how to get rid of lice infestations.
But she says before she can get down to work, there’s big hurdle to jump –
that is, overcoming the embarrassment and shame parents feel when their kids
get lice.
“The lice problem is everywhere, it’s if people are willing to talk
about it or not. And once we get them to step up and start to talk about it
and address it, get over with the denial thing, then we can finally do
something about it.”
Many people believe lice outbreaks only happen in dirty houses, to unbathed
kids.
But in fact, all types of families are affected.
Most of the parents here today say they’ve tried using everything from
over-the-counter shampoos, to home remedies.
“We went from Rid to the Robie comb. We did mayonnaise, we called the
doctor. The doctor gave us a prescription. That didn’t work, either.”
But the experts here today say you can beat a lice problem – if you’re thorough and
persistent.
They say a key component to success is teaching people about lice.
They’re tiny, blood-sucking parasites that live on the scalp, and lay eggs on
strands of hair.
They’re easy to get, and a lot harder to get rid of.
After the families are treated with a lice-killing shampoo, they put on
plastic shower caps and wait a half-hour for the solution to work.
While they wait, they visit the education room.
Todd Bilinsky and his five kids are gathered ‘round a microscope, checking
out a lice, magnified forty times.
Bilinsky says the family’s had a lice problem on and off for about two years.
“Every week, I’d go through their hair – almost on a daily basis, trying
to go through their hair. They just are tired of the treatments, and I’m
tired of giving them the treatments. And then I’m never sure
further down in their lives, what all these treatments, you know, what kind
of effect they’re going to have on them.”
And that brings up another goal of Operation Lice Be Gone.
Vicky Bishop and the other lice control experts here today are trying to raise
awareness of how to get rid of lice without using
pesticides.
They say safer shampoos are now available that use vegetable-derived enzymes.
However, there’s some debate about the effectiveness of those products.
Here in the rinse room, a young girl is in the final stages of her lice
treatment.
“Here, put your head down there, we’ll rinse the very ends of it.”
Vicky Bishop is rinsing out the shampoo and re-inspecting the girl’s hair to
make sure all the lice are dead, and all the nits are gone.
Girl: “There’s one right there, on the end of it.”
Vicky: “Let’s see if that’s a nit. Will you hand me a nit comb, please?”
About thirty people were treated here today at Operation Lice Be Gone.
But Vicky Bishop says the project was still successful, because it’s getting
the word out about the lice epidemic – letting people know they aren’t
alone, and showing them it’s nothing to be ashamed of.
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Wendy Nelson in Cedar Springs,
Michigan.
No matter where you travel around the region, you’ll find kids
playing all kinds of organized sports – from baseball to bowling. But a
growing number of young people around the Great Lakes are embracing a
sport that’s traditionally been practiced in the Western U-S. The Great
Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson reports:
Transcript
About a dozen boys and girls are gathered outside on a chilly, windy afternoon in Kent City,
Michigan dressed in jeans, cowboy boots and hats. They’ve gome to practice the sport of rodeo. The
athletes specialize in different events, including barrel racing, goat tying and steer wrestling.
Tonight, they’re at Sue and Andy Sharp’s house to practice. Most of the kids bring their own
horses, and the Sharps have a few steers for roping and wrestling.
SUE: “You would like to be able to practice once or twice a week at least, if possible. Not all
the kids can do that, though, because some don’t have a place near them, and they have to travel
quite a ways.”
The Sharps met when they were both competing on the Pro Rodeo Circuit. But now, they’re passing on
their skills to a new generation of riders.
“In 1974, when I first started, and before that, there were rodeos. But nowhere near as many are
there now. When they went through the phase of the urban cowboy, it really started to grow east of
the Mississippi and got more notoriety and people started to get involved, and that’s continued
on.”
Still, rodeo riders aren’t exactly commonplace in these parts, but their ranks are steadily
growing – fed by the increasing number of high school rodeo teams and 4-H programs. In fact,
several of the current youth rodeo champs come from the Great Lakes States. Wisconsin is home to
the world champion high school bareback rider. Indiana hosts the world champion in pole bending.
And Michigan is the home of the national champion bull rider.
With programs like the Little Britches Rodeo Association, kids as young as toddlers can get
involved in the sport. Tonight, Cody Schmitz has the distinction of being the youngest one at the
practice session.
CODY: “I’m a bull rider.”
NELSON: “You’re a bull rider. How old are you?”
CODY: “Ten.”
NELSON: “Ten. And you ride a bull.”
CODY: “But I don’t ride, like, big bulls. I ride, like, these steers and stuff.”
Cody says just like other athletes, he gets nervous before a ride.
CODY: “You get butterflies and stuff, but once you get on, then they just go away and you’re just
having fun and sitting there. But it’s not very good to hang up.
NELSON: “What does that mean, to hang up?”
CODY: “Hang up as in, your hand’s still stuck in the rope and then it’s pulling and stuff. Well,
it’s not very good.”
Cody weighs about ninety pounds and stands just under five feet. But the steers can weigh hundreds
of pounds, so it’s a kind of understatement to say that rodeo can be dangerous. Just ask Matt
Kostel. He used to compete, but now he just watches from the sidelines.
“Had a little accident with a bull. He caught me in the forehead right here with a horn and put me
in the hospital. And they put plates in my forehead and screws and had to do reconstructive
surgery on me.”
Even so, Kostel hopes to someday return to the sport. For many – like Cody Schmitz – the rewards
outweigh the risks. Riders can win cash and even college scholarships. Cody’s only been competing
for a couple of years, but he’s already set his sights on becoming a pro. At tonight’s practice,
he’s decked out in a protective vest and mouth guard – ready to ride a steer.
(sound of rosin rubbing on rope)
“All right! Come on, Cody!”
Cody’s fourteen-year-old brother, Eric, helps him get ready: rubbing rosin on the rope for a
better grip. Then Eric and some of the other boys gather ’round to give Cody some final bits of
advice.
ERIC: “No matter what he does, keep shuffling your feet. Feel comfortable – start kicking.”
GUY 2: “Get right up on your hands, don’t get off it.”
Then Cody gives the signal, and they’re off.
GUYS: “Look at ’em buck, Cody! Look at ’em buck!”
The steer almost immediately throws cody to the ground, and the whole thing’s over in a matter of
seconds. Cody’s hurting from a hard fall on his elbow. But after a pep talk from his brother Eric,
he’s soon up and ready to ride again.
ERIC: “How bad do you want it?”
CODY: “Bad.”
ERIC: “Then you better try. Because without trying, you ain’t got nothing, right?”
CODY: “Right.”
This ride goes better for Cody. He’s able to hold on a little longer before getting bucked off.
It’s a close-knit group here tonight – not just the brothers, but all of the riders. And most say
they’ll continue riding, either as pros or just for fun, because, as Eric Schmitz says, rodeo is
as much a lifestyle as it is a sport.
“I mean, everybody’s together, everybody’s friends, you help each other out. I don’t know how to
explain it – it’s just kind of a cowboy deal, I guess. And I couldn’t imagine myself doing a thing
different.”
For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Wendy Nelson in Kent City, Michigan.
It’s not unusual for volunteers to help collect data for environmental
studies like frog surveys or bird counts. But there’s another kind of
project going on that studies wildlife in a very different way. The
Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson reports:
In school when kids learn about the environment… they often learn
about the devastation of the rain forests in South America; they learn
about lemurs in Madagascar…. and about the melting of the polar ice
caps. They don’t often learn about the environment in their own
hometowns. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Lester Graham reports…
some school children are getting a chance to learn about the environment
around them and what they can do to protect it:
We usually hear about Integrated Pest Management – or I-P-M – as itrelates to agriculture. In that setting, it’s a way to help reduce oreliminate the amount of pesticides farmers use on their crops. But theconcept of I-P-M is catching on in other places too.As the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Wendy Nelson reports, somestates are taking Integrated Pest Management from the cornfields, righton into the classroom.