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MULTICULTURAL EDUCATION |
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Science & Spanish Club Network
One of the Gulf of Mexico Foundation's most innovative
programs is a multicultural outreach project working to
bring English-speaking and Spanish-speaking students together through science education. Established in 2000, the
GMF Science &
 Spanish
Club Network is an extracurricular multicultural approach to coastal environmental education.
Directed by Project Coordinator
Richard Gonzales of the Gulf of Mexico
Foundation, the multicultural science club project is funded
through grants from the Texas General Land Office, the EPA,
NOAA, and the Gulf of Mexico Foundation.
The program strives to develop youth leadership through teaching stewardship of the Gulf of Mexico
and the greater Gulf Stream ecosystem. The network stretches along the Gulf coast, with
11 sites along the Texas Gulf coast, 2 along the Mexico Gulf
coast and one
in Puerto Rico. Participating clubs include public
school districts, Boys & Girls Clubs and private schools (see
list of club locations at right).
The GMF S&S Club Network uses Texas as the gateway to
establishing people-to-people relations
between the U.S. and Mexico to address environmental
concerns. Club meetings are held in both English and Spanish
to not only help English-speaking students learn Spanish but
to give students whose primary language is Spanish a chance
to learn in their native tongue. Together, the students learn
language and science skills through participating in
environmentally oriented educational projects focused on the
Gulf of Mexico and the watersheds that empty into it.
Activities
include dragging seine nets through bay waters to learn
firsthand what lives beneath the surface, kayaking through
wetlands to monitor animal and plant life, cleaning up trash
along coastal areas, and attending events such as Earth Day.
The Science & Spanish Club's goal is to develop a cadre of
young students who are knowledgeable about coastal society,
both as observers and residents. In addition, it strives to
teach students the importance of building long-distance,
long-term relationships.
The project’s long-term plan is to connect the middle school
network currently in place to middle
schools in the other Gulf States (Louisiana, Mississippi,
Alabama and Florida). Plans also include establishing
counterpart connections along the Gulf states of Mexico:
Tamaulipas, Vera Cruz, Campeche, Tabasco, Quintana Roo and
Yucatan.
The S&S Club Network was originally designed as a coastal
environmental education program for middle school students
but, since it now has "alumni" who have moved on to high
school, the program has begun to reach out at the high school
level as well, starting with Aransas Pass High School in
Texas. |
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CLUB LOCATIONS
TEXAS COASTAL BEND
Van Vleck
Bay City
Tidehaven
Edna
Palacios
El Campo
Port Lavaca
Aransas Pass
Ingleside
Sinton
Corpus Christi
SOUTH TEXAS COAST
Port Isabel
Brownsville
MEXICO
Matamoros
Tampico
PUERTO RICO
Penuelas
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CLUB EVENTS 2008
April 5 - 2nd Annual Bahia Grande Limpienato
Parade and Coastal Cleanup, Port Isabel, Texas.
Three clubs with 100 volunteers will participate.
>> VIEW PRESS RELEASE
April 8 - Gulf of Mexico Alliance Environmental
Education Committee meeting @ Texas State Aquarium in
Corpus Christi
April 19 - 12th Annual Earth Day Bay Day in Corpus Christi,
Texas. Seven clubs with 150 volunteers will exhibit
ecology games and display coastal artwork.
April 26 - Earth Week Celebration in Bay City,
Texas. Five clubs with 100 volunteers will participate.
May 10 - 4th Annual Gulf of Mexico Youth
Leadership in Stewardship Conference, Corpus Christi Omni
Bayfront Hotel 9:30 am - 4:30 pm
(also GMF Board Meeting)
May 17 - Bay Day in Galveston, Texas. Van Vleck
club will display its "Beaches and Bays of Matagorda
County" ecology game.
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PAST EVENTS 2008
March 12 - Beach cleanup at Playa Baghdad,
Matamoros Colegio Juvenal Rendon
March 8 - GMF S&S Club Network Faculty Workshop, Corpus Christi 10 am
- 2 pm, to discuss May 10 GMF Youth Leadership in
Stewardship Conference
Feb 19 - Coastal Zone Obligation Day (Aransas Pass, Ingleside and Sinton)
Feb 16-23 - Economy = Ecology Week
Feb 16 - 3rd Annual Redfish
Bay Trash Parade & Coastal Cleanup (Aransas Pass, Sinton,
Ingleside, Corpus Christi Edna)
Feb 16 - Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at Lighthouse Lakes
Trail Park
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S&S IN THE NEWS
April 27, 2007 - GMF S&S Club
Network helps to rename causeway 'Redfish Bay' - Corpus
Christi Caller-Times
 May 2, 2007 -
GMF S&S Club Network accepts state's top environmental
achievement honor during ceremony in Austin, Texas.
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Science & Spanish Club News
• Feb 2008 - Clubs march in parade, clean beach, restore marsh
• Feb 2008 - S&S Clubs create first Ecology = Economy Week
• Feb 2008 - Palacios clubs create 'river dragon' for parade
• Jan 2008 - Message-in-a-bottle experiments teach students
• Dec 2007 - Clubs tour lakes, learn first hand about watersheds
• Nov 2007 - South Texas clubs participate in trash clean-up
• Sept 2007 - Coastal Bend clubs clean up, learn at Matagorda
• Sept 2007 - Clubs clean up Lighthouse Lakes Park, more
• May 2007 - 3M Corporation presents check to S&S Club
• Feb 2007 - S&S Club organizes two-town Trash Parade
Clubs march in parade, clean beach, restore marsh
Feb 2008 -
Science & Spanish Clubs from the Texas Coastal Bend kicked off Ecology = Economy week with the
3rd Annual Redfish Bay Trash Parade & Coastal
Cleanup on February 16. The parade began in Ingleside and reconvened with another parade through downtown Aransas Pass.
After the parade, some clubs participated in the Texas General Land Office's Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at the Lighthouse Lakes Trail Park along Redfish Bay
Causeway while others went to Goose Island State Park to transplant marsh grasses as part of a habitat restoration project. |
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S&S Clubs create first Ecology = Economy Week
Feb 2008 - The first
Aransas/San Patricio County Economy = Ecology Week held Feb
16-23 featured a Trash Parade, Redfish Bay Cleanup, Goose
Island Marsh Restoration and Obligation Day. The event was
organized by the GMF and sponsored by Texas Transportation Institute, Valero, Cheniere LNG, San Patricio Economic Development Commission, Coastal Bend Bays Foundation, Texas Parks & Wildlife, Dairy Queen of South Texas,
and the Texas General Land Office’s Coastal Management Program.
The economy side of the Economy = Ecology formula featured an
Obligation Day on Feb 19 at the Aransas Pass High School
gymnasium where students learned about coastal workforce
training, education and employment choices available where
they live. Obligation Day featured several local and regional
employers including South Texas Nuclear Power, Texas Department of Transportation, Shiner Moseley
Engineering, Texas Parks & Wildlife, the US Navy and TAMU-CC Nursing School.
"These companies are looking to recruit workers now and in
the near-future, said Richard Gonzales, GMF's Project Coordinator for the Science & Spanish Club Network.
For that reason, we
invited community leaders from chambers or commerce, city councils,
school boards and other community groups to meet with the
exhibiting companies during a Community Bleacher Lunch
sponsored by Cheniere LNG,”
Gonzales said. |
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Palacios clubs create 'river dragon' for parade
Feb 2008 -
Science & Spanish Clubs from Van Vleck and Palacios marched in the 60th Annual
Harmony Club Valentine's Parade in Palacios, Texas, on Feb 9.
To carry in the parade, students and faculty helped
to design and make a "river dragon" made of sheer fabric to
represent the watershed approach to coastal environmental
stewardship and upstream-midstream-downstream
community-based cooperation. |
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Message-in-a-bottle experiments teach students
 Jan 2008
- Science & Spanish Clubs from Texas learned about
scientific experiments conducted by students from two
schools which are faraway but which lie near the Gulf Stream. Science
students
from schools in New York and Puerto Rico put messages in bottles
and released them into the Gulf Stream to see where the
bottles would land. A school from Long Island,
New York launched a message in a bottle in 1999 which was
found on Matagorda Beach in Texas in 2007 (see photo at
right). A school from the island of Puerto Rico launched 84 bottles
in November 2006 off the southern coast of the island and
bottle #13 was found by volunteers at the Adopt-A-Beach
Cleanup in April 2007. Science & Spanish Club members are
studying
message-in-a-bottle experiments using real-time sensors to
track the natural movement of the bottles via satellite. |
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Clubs tour lakes, learn first hand about watersheds
Dec 2007 -
Science & Spanish Clubs from Aransas Pass, Ingleside and Sinton explored the
man-made lakes at Lake Texana in Jackson County and the
7,000-acre lake that supplies water to the South Texas
Nuclear Power Plant near Bay City, Texas. These field trips
helped to show how people influence natural watersheds. Next
these students will connect with the Science & Spanish Club
in Edna, Texas, to explore the Mary Rhodes Pipeline, a humanized watershed that brings fresh water from Lake Texana
to Corpus Christi 120 miles to the south. Corpus Christi then redistributes
the water to several Coastal Bend communities. |
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South Texas clubs participate in trash clean-up
Nov 2007 - Science & Spanish Clubs from Port Isabel and
Brownsville joined hundreds of other volunteers in the 3rd Annual Bahia Grande/Laguna
Madre Coastal Cleanup on Nov 10. The event was organized by Cameron County
Parks & Recreation, the City of Port Isabel, the Port Isabel
Economic Development Commission and Red River Services.
Nearly three tons of trash were picked up in several trash hot
spots around the Bahia Grande and Laguna Madre. |
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Coastal Bend clubs clean up, learn at Matagorda
Sept 2007 - More than 180 members of the Science & Spanish Club Network helped to boost the largest volunteer turnout (300)
ever for the Texas General Land Office Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at Matagorda Beach held on September 22. Students from Tidehaven,
Edna, Bay City, Port Lavaca, El Campo and Palacios joined
more than 100 other community volunteers as hundreds of bags
of beach debris was picked up. "The Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup
experience teaches youth leadership by example skills by
learning how to take the initiative in picking up other
people’s trash,” explained S&S Club Network coordinator
Richard Gonzales.
“Students are also introduced to the scientific method
as they record the types of shoreline trash picked up. Data is collected on data cards provided by the
Ocean Conservancy who have been organizing a global beach
cleanup effort for over 30 years now. Students come to
understand that trash is a global problem that will be
solved only through local communities taking responsibility
for their part of the coastline,” he said.
Science & Spanish Clubs from El Campo, Palacios, Tidehaven,
Edna, Port Lavaca and Bay City joined other volunteers at the Texas General Land Office Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup
held on Sept 22 on Matagorda Island, Texas.
Science & Spanish Club students from Tidehaven, Texas,
assemble in front of the Lower Colorado River Authority
Nature Learning Center as they prepare to measure sand dune
erosion along Matagorda Beach as part of their Adopt-A-Beach
cleanup experience on Sept 22.
Science & Spanish Club students from Edna, Texas, take a break from their volunteer work at the Texas General Land Office Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup
on Matagorda Sept 22. |
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Clubs clean up Lighthouse Lakes Park, more
Sept 2007 - More than 130
members of the Science & Spanish Club Network helped to boost
the largest volunteer turnout (160) ever for the Texas General Land Office Fall Adopt-A-Beach Cleanup at the Lighthouse Lakes Park,
Conn Brown Harbor and the Aransas Pass Aquatics Center held on September 22.
Science & Spanish Clubs from Sinton,
Ingleside, Corpus Christi and Aransas Pass joined over 30 other community volunteers as 300 hundred bags of beach debris were picked up. |
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3M Corporation presents check to S&S Club
Photo by Diana Gonzales - click to enlarge
May 2007 -
3M Corporation-Brownwood surprised the GMF’s
Science & Spanish Club Network middle-school students at the 2007 Texas Environmental
Excellence (TEE) Awards on May 7 by presenting them with a check for $2,500 for
the work they have done to promote a healthy environment in the Gulf of Mexico region.
The bilingual science education project has expanded to include students in coastal zone communities
from Texas to Mexico. At the TEE awards ceremony, the GMF’s S&S Club Network received the
award in the Youth category. "It was a day the kids will not forget,"
said GMF Executive Director Dr. Quenton Dokken about the award, adding,
"And, the grant from 3M Corporation was more icing on the cake. Many of
the kids come from disadvantage backgrounds and the check from 3M was
mind boggling! When I last saw them after the event, they were walking
down the hall carrying the oversized check mock up. It was a gold medal
in their eyes. I have no idea how they packed it into their van." At the same banquet, 3M Corporation-Brownwood received the award in the
Large Business/Technical category for
its innovative methods that helped to reduce volatile organic compound
emissions, to reduce waste and to improve energy efficiency. The GMF congratulates 3M Brownwood for its
award, and appreciates its financial support of the GMF S&S Club Network. |
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S&S Club organizes two-town Trash Parade
Photos by Carrie Robertson - click to enlarge
Feb 2007 -
GMF Science & Spanish Club members from five schools in the Texas
 Coastal Bend area
joined together to march for a cleaner environment during the 2nd
Annual Redfish Bay Trash Parade on Saturday morning, Feb 17. Dressed in
matching parade T-shirts, the students first marched in Ingleside, then
got back in school buses and rode to Aransas Pass, where they marched
again. In both parades, they carried themed banners, posters and flags,
and shouted slogans such as "Pick up your trash," and "Please don't
litter." The event was part of the annual Winter Beach Cleanup
sponsored by the Texas General Land Office. "The students have leaned
that they share a common ecosystem that is Redfish Bay with its vast
sensitive seagrass pasture," said Richard Gonzales, project
coordinator, adding, "Marine debris, whether it comes from land,
rivers, bays or the gulf, is caused mostly by human behavior." |
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Gulf of Mexico Foundation - PMB 51, 5403 Everhart - Corpus Christi, TX 78411
(800) 884-4175 toll free - (361) 882-3939 phone - (361) 882-1262 fax
e-mail:
info@gulfmex.org
website:
gulfmex.org
webmaster:
Carrie Robertson
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