Floating Classroom with Dream Team Co-op
Miami, Florida
October 23, 2023
Overview
On Monday, October 23rd, The International SeaKeepers Society’s educational team hosted students and parents from Dream Team Co-op for a floating classroom. We were joined by 13 students and 9 parents at Bill Bird Marina where we boarded DISCOVERY Yacht River Queen. Today we headed South in the bay while we discussed the Everglades, Miami’s watershed, the ecology of Biscayne Bay, and sources of pollution in the bay. The students identified many types of possible pollution, including trash, oil and gas, and excess nutrients. We collected a water sample from the bay and used our EarthEcho kits to perform water quality testing. We discussed the implications of the parameters tested for temperature, pH, dissolved oxygen, and turbidity. Once we finished testing for these values we compared the results from each group and discussed which values may be outliers that differed due to error. We found a water temperature of about 79 degrees F, a pH of about 7, a dissolved oxygen level of about 2 ppm, and a turbidity of 0 JTU. The dissolved oxygen level has remained low recently, and we hope to see it increase soon, as marine organisms depend on that oxygen for survival. We finished the day with a cleanup at Sandspur Island, which is one picnic island in the bay where many people pull up their boats and spend the day. The high level of traffic and picnicking on the island has made it a hot spot for litter, despite the presence of trash cans. Our students got to work collecting any garbage they could find, which consisted of a lot of beverage bottles, food wrappers, bottle caps, and cigarette butts. Within 30 minutes, our volunteers collected 41 pounds of trash, which we bagged and removed from the island. We are grateful to Dream Team Co-op for joining us and to DISCOVERY Yacht River Queen for taking us out!
Outing Goal
To enhance the knowledge of the students of Dream Team Co-op about marine ecology and ocean pollution.
Partner Sites
Dream Team Co-op
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