WATSONVILLE — On roughly 40 acres of farmland that overlooks Harkins Slough, which Stephen Pedersen, owner of High Ground Organics, says is “land that shall remain in use for agricultural use only,” students from Watsonville and Pajaro Valley high schools met Friday to collect data that will be used for designing a new digital map app for smartphones.
Once finished, the app will be available for anybody to use.
The app will include “content that motivates people to protect the wetlands,” said Stew Jenkins, director of Monterey Bay Center for Environmental Literacy (MBEL).
Only a select few students were chosen to participate in creating the new smartphone app, from ages 15 to 18.
“Based on their interests, skills, and if they like to write, was the criteria I followed when choosing the interns,” said Stephanie Rios from Watsonville Wetlands Watch.
Throughout the week, the students will be gathering data from a number of area sloughs, such as Watsonville Slough and Elkhorn Slough.
“This is a good opportunity for me to learn about wildlife and agriculture,” said Alexandra Lopez, 15, a student at Watsonville High School.
The program is being funded by a $49,000 grant the MBEL received from the California Coastal Conservancy.
“The $49,000 grant will be used to guide high school students as they create digital content for seven miles of trails throughout Santa Cruz County,” Jenkins said. “The final product will be like interpretive signage on a nature trail, i.e. written text about birds, trees, plants and wildflowers of the sloughs.”
Established in 2016, MBEL aims to help students become “environmentally literate citizens,” Jenkins said, by helping school administrators develop environmental literacy curriculum, as well as leading field trips on fresh water sources, climate change and more.
For information about the MBEL project, visit www.mbel.center.
