Struthers high-schoolers testing health of Yellow Creek

STRUTHERS

Rachael Leonard found today’s excursion into the wilds of Yellow Creek Park a bit surprising.

Donning a pair of waders, the Struthers High School senior said that, for one, traipsing through the creek’s waters was “more slippery than you would think.”

The act wasn’t without purpose, however. Leonard was one of 13 students in Geoff Malcomson’s Advanced Placement Environmental Science class who spent the entire school day studying the health of the stream.

“It’s just to give them some awareness about their local environment,” Malcomson said. “Watching them fall in the water is kind of fun, too.”

The students — 12 seniors and one junior — arrived at Yellow Creek Park, a 76-acre gorge area in Struthers, at 9 a.m. Thursday and continued their work until 3 p.m. They stopped just once, and only to lunch briefly while sitting, perhaps reluctantly, on some moss-covered rocks.

Students ran chemical tests to determine properties of the water and sampled macroinvertebrates to help determine the quality of the stream.

Read more about the project in Friday's Vindicator or on Vindy.com.