Author: yalluri1

My Neighborhood’s Creek

by yalluri1

Volunteering with Atlanta Creek League has been amazing and beyond my expectations this semester. Through this opportunity, I’ve explored my neighborhood and parts of it that I didn’t even know existed. About two weeks ago, Hannah(One of the founders of Atlanta Creek League) and I explored the neighborhood I live in to determine the water flow using the creek’s start and end point. During this process, we discovered that my neighborhood’s creek doesn’t have a name, so we plan to name it soon, and for the time being, we are calling it ‘Garden Hills Creek.’

So, we first started locating the water stream in different parks in the neighborhood, and we successfully figured out that the Creek water starts at ‘Frankie Allen Park’ and ends at ‘Peachtree Hills Park.’ We’ve found that the water comes through a pipe at ‘Frankie Allen Park,’ from there, it’s just a stream again flowing through a couple of pipes.

So the creek flows as such: ‘Frankie Allen Park’ —– ‘Sunny Brook Park’ —– ‘Alexander Park’ —– ‘Peachtree Hills Park’ —– ‘Peachtree Creek.’ There is another creek that flows from ‘Sidney Marcus Trail’ and then connects to the one from ‘Alexander Park’ and combines flow to ‘Peachtree Hills Park.’ The creek is rich with wildlife, and based on my observation, the water seemed clean and fresh. Also, Hannah taught me the difference between English Ivy and Poison Ivy. It was an experience I would never forget, and I still keep visiting these parks every weekend since I first visited them for sights of new observations and encounters.

So as this creek has no name to it for now, Hannah and I are thinking of giving it a name, and soon we’ll be planning to work on it. I never thought that I would be connected to an organization as I currently do with Atlanta Creek League. I personally love exploring the nature-rich parts around me, but I never thought that I’d have some very close to me, and being a part of this organization helped me with that. For my final project, my fellow volunteering partner Noor and I decided to share our experiences and discuss some basic information about creeks in general. We will combine our experiences and our creek’s information for better understanding.

Introduction: Yashwanth Alluri

by yalluri1

Hey everyone!!! My name is Yashwanth Alluri, and I am a junior majoring in Computer Science. I transferred from India to Georgia State University in the Fall of 2022, and moving far from family and home has been the most challenging decision ever. It has been a ride ever since I moved here, as everything is so different, and I’m still adapting to it. However, this massive change in my life has led me to learn and grow every single day, and I’m grateful for it all. Although I have lived in Atlanta for over a semester, I still have yet to see much of it. So at the end of the Fall semester, when I decided to register for classes, I came across the Honors Service Learning class, and Dr. Finck’s course description quickly caught my attention.

I thought this class would help me have a lot of experiences in and out of the classroom environment, and I genuinely enjoy this class much more than any other class I’ve taken. We’ve had a lot of classroom discussions about current environmental topics, and hearing different perspectives and opinions helped shape my view on many of these topics. We’ve also read this fantastic novel, “Urban Tumbleweed: Notes from a Tanka Diary.” Everyone had a chance to discuss 2-3 pieces they thought were their favorites and give their perspectives. I am now getting in to start with my out-of-class experience with the community partner of my choice that I got matched with. The “Amphibian Foundation” is a non-profit dedicated to conserving amphibians and promoting awareness of the global amphibian decline.

I personally never had any experience with amphibians before, so I am so excited to get this opportunity to have it now. I have also looked at the communities website and social media pages; their blogs were amazing and fun. I am very excited about this new experience and the memories I will carry forward after my volunteering work is finished there.