Author: serickson11

Blog Post #6

by serickson11

Howdy everyone! Since my last time posting, not a whole heck of a lot has changed from what I was doing before but I’ll give a few smaller updates. For starters, we have continued to do the weekly trash trap cleanouts and do the standard ETAPs for what we collect (ETAPs are forensic litter audits using the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Escaped Trash Assessment Protocol—in simple terms it is just categorizing what was collected into subcategories like take-out boxes, shopping bags, water bottles, etc. and marking brands that show up repeatedly).

One location we did, we ended up collecting nearly 30 full manicure/pedicure kits as well as roughly 10 half-to-full cans of yellow spray paint (an odd collection of items if I do say so myself). Our assumption for the spray cans was that someone was fixing certain parking and road lines up by the nearby road and purposefully disposed of the rest of the cans for reasons unknown. For the manicure/pedicure kits, we guess since they were prepackaged and seemed undamaged that a truck delivering the product had a shipment fall off and land somewhere in the river. Either way, both acts come from a place ignorance and since both ended up in the river, they both should be held accountable for their faulty choices. 

Another thing that I noticed is that one of the reasons it takes extra time to clean out each trash trap is the sheer amount of sticks, leaves, and general parts of nature that end up making their way in amongst all of the collectable trash and recycling. I talked about this with Jordan and it seems there is no real effective way to sort out the items that CRK seeks to collect out of the river and distribute the natural items back into the stream, but I would love to see some type of advancement in that area sometime in the future because it definitely adds another level of difficulty for those who have a kind enough soul to clean those traps for a living. 

I am coming up on my last time volunteering with CRK in person but I can definitely see myself helping them out with larger river clean ups in future and I can truly say I have appreciated the opportunities I have had to work alongside them this semester. 

Blog Post #4 – Chattahoochee Riverkeeper

by serickson11

        Hi everyone! This is my first official blog post so I have a good amount of time to recap but I mostly want to focus on what has occurred in the last two-ish weeks. The biggest thing so far has definitely been the annual Sweep the Hooch event that Mina and I attended on Saturday, March 23rd. There were over 64 sites cleaned, Mina and I went to the Murphey Candler Park one from 9am to 12pm and we got very lucky because we had beautiful weather (the photo is from one of the trails we cleaned up). 

        We mostly stayed on land due to not having proper waders but we still worked our tails off collecting all of the tiny trash that would have washed into the water eventually if not picked up. In total, on Saturday there were 46 volunteers including ourselves at our location and we managed to collect 1530 lbs of trash, 380 lbs of recycling and 5 tires (a pretty impressive amount if I do say so myself). The biggest takeaways I had from this was how easy it was to do a little good for this earth by spending some easy hours collecting trash and that Double Bubble desperately needs to make their packing biodegradable because I picked up so many of those little wrappers to the point I almost went insane. 

         Before this Saturday, I had been going to Chattahoochee Riverkeeper on Fridays to help with trash collection from the trash traps and conducting ETAPs (essentially a forensic litter audit using the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s Escaped Trash Assessment Protocol—in simple terms it is just categorizing what was collected into subcategories like take-out boxes, shopping bags, water bottles, etc. and marking brands that show up repeatedly). In this process they also collect water samples to do tests for high levels of anything dangerous in the water. A major situation unfolded while I was there on the 15th when CRK detected dangerously high levels of E. coli in the Chattahoochee River downstream from the R.M. Clayton Water Reclamation Center. There was a big problem with how the AJC was reporting it and spreading misinformation about how long those high levels had been detected and CRK had to make public statements suggesting staying out of the water and requesting that a more factual timeline be displayed to the public. Jordan Yu (CRK Watershed Protection Specialist), Mina and I actually went to the Water Reclamation Center to get a sample from where the water was going into the river (big big big shoutout to Mina for sacrificing herself by getting in full gear to get close to the splashing sewer water). When we got back news stations were there to talk to CRK and Mina and I went inside to thoroughly cleanse ourselves from the nasty water. 

         So far, I have really enjoyed having this opportunity to work with Chattahoochee Riverkeeper and could definitely see myself participating in their local events after this class ends based on the good time I had at the Sweep the Hooch event. 

Introduction: Sydney Erickson

by serickson11

Howdy! 

My name is Sydney Erickson and I am a first-year finance major here at GSU. I am excited to have the opportunity to be enrolled in Honors 3280: Service-Learning Seminar in Urban Ecology and Environmental Conservation this semester with Dr. Finck. My main reason for choosing this course was that I found the idea of being able to give back to my community while earning college credit an incredibly good use of my time. I must admit that I did not expect to have that the opportunity to learn and read as much as we had in the first part of this semester, but after having done so, I am incredibly grateful that we did. I feel that I was able to refine some of my own personal opinions through reading the opinions of McKibben and Purdy as well as gain whole new perspectives on major problems I was unaware so many were impacted by (i.e. superfunds as discussed by Kathryn Savage). A multitude of the readings we discussed in class emphasized how the existence of nature and humans play off of each other, and although I had a baseline understanding of this concept, I had never taken the proper time to discuss what it truly meant and how that therefore impacts my day-to-day life. 

For this semester, I will be working with the Chattahoochee Riverkeeper, which is something I am quite excited about! The interaction I have had with Jordan Yu (Chattahoochee Riverkeeper’s Watershed Protection Specialist) has been somewhat limited due to him taking part in Water Professionals event but what I have gathered from our discussions is that it seems that my work will fall in line with litter cleanup and analysis, water sampling, pollution tracking, speaking events, workshops, or social media. I have spent multiple years volunteering for Rivers Alive (a river clean up organization) and because of this I know that I have a great deal of interest when it comes to rivers and waterways in Georgia, which is why this organization stood out to me in the first place. Another reason I am so excited to work with this organization is because of their activism. When comparing McKibben and Purdy, I felt my viewpoints aligned more so with Purdy’s view on how impactful laws are when it comes to preservation, so it I was beyond thrilled when I saw on Chattahoochee Riverkeeper’s website that they take special interest in advocating for bills that would protect our waters. Alongside this, they also emphasize the importance educating and investing in those same waters, which just adds to how wonderful this organization seems and makes me fueled with excitement to be able to contribute with my time and final project. I am thrilled to have the opportunity to work for them and I look forward to what is to come this semester! 

Good luck everyone!