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VOLUNTEERS

NEEDED!!


The Delta Science Center is looking for volunteers this summer. Activities including working at various festivals and fairs helping to spread the word about the Delta Science Center.


Fundraisers and Grant writers needed to help the Delta Science Center raise much needed funds during the summer. 


Sat., June 22 & 29

Transplanting experimental rice field from nursery to larger fields. 

No experience necessary.

 

For more info on volunteering

 email us!


Delta Science Center News and Notes

Volunteers needed to help the DSC transplant our rice fields for AFRI Rice Culture Project
The DSC is looking for volunteers to help transplant rice from our nursery fields to the larger fields. There is no experience necessary. The job is simple, help uproot plants from the nursery and help transplant them to the other fields. This is a muddy job, but is really a fun way to spend an afternoon, especially if you love to garden. We will have everything ready and an expert on hand to help train us how to do the transplanting. 

This is part of our AFRI Rice Mitigation project that we are working on on Jersey Island. We are adding a high school component to the UC Davis and UC Berkeley experiments in hopes in finding a way to reduce carbon emission in the Delta Region, as well as try to reduce island subsidence, both very crucial issues in our Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. We are working with Freedom High School students on the testing of air (carbon emissions), soil and water. 

This event will need approximately 20 to 30 volunteers so that it can be done as quickly as possible. For details, email rgehlke@deltasciencecenter.org.

Uploaded some photos from the Oakley Science Week event--Extreme Delta-Delta Predators
The event was April 27, 2013 and presented by the Delta Science Center, Ironhouse Sanitary District and Diablo Water. It was well attended. Visitors were able to see a Delta Predator display from the DSC as well as a live bird show featuring the Native Bird Connection Group. 

For more information and photos see our special events page for Oakley Science Week 2013.

Delta Science Center's new blog
The DSC has started a new blog with information on our current projects. Presently we are working on the AFRI Rice Mitigation Grant Project. The new blog has up-to-date progress on our rice field and the testing the students are doing on it. As other projects come in we'll be adding information on those projects as well. 

Here is the link http://deltasciencecenter.blogspot.org. Don't forget to sign up for email notifications for when new information is uploaded. 

AFRI Grant Freedom Student Application ready for submission
If you are a student at Oakley's Freedom High School and would like to participate in the AFRI Rice Mitigation Grant Program check with your science teacher for an application beginning Friday, April 5 or attend the special meeting on Friday, April 5 from 11:15 am to 12:15 pm. Event location is at Freedom High School. Please ask your science teacher which room we'll be in. 

The orientation meeting will explain what you need to know about the program. This is part of the same program that Science Students attended during their science classes last month. If you can't make the meeting, but wish to receive an application please email the DSC's executive director at rgehlke@deltasciencecenter.org. Only Freedom High School student can apply to be part of this research project.

City of Oakley proclaims March 22, 2013 World Water Monitoring Day in Oakley, California

Pictures: Proclamation given to the Delta Science Center from the City of Oakley during the March 12 City Council Meeting. Vice Mayor Randy Pope hands a proclamation to Delta Science Center, executive director Roni Gehlke and Board President Dr. Michael Painter.

Tuesday, March 12, 2013—Clean water is necessary to our survival and teaching children the value to keeping our Delta clean and safe for not only drinking, but also for the environment and wildlife around us, is one of the main goals of the Delta Science Center. That is why the DSC is working with other organizations around the world and participating in the World Water Monitoring Challenge on March 22.

The program gives students the chance to learn about the importance to clean water by allowing them to test the local waterways around them. On March 22, 2013, which has been proclaimed to be World Water Monitoring Day in Oakley by the City of Oakley, fifth graders throughout Oakley are invited to come to Big Break Regional Shoreline Park where water testing will be completed on the San Joaquin River.

Since school will be out on Spring Break during this time, students are welcome to come on their own to the park to do the testing. This program is specific to the date of March 22, so we could not postpone the testing until school comes back in session.

An easy-to-use test kit enables everyone from children to adults to sample local water bodies for a core set of water quality parameters including temperature, pH (acidity), turbidity (clarity) and dissolved oxygen (DO).   

After testing all of the results will be added to an international database that will list students test results from rivers and waterways throughout the world so that others might compare the results.

World Water Monitoring Challenge (WWMC) is designed primarily as an education and awareness raising activity to bring communities closer to their local water bodies. The data collected through WWMC activities can provide an annual glance at local water quality, and gives community groups, students, citizens, scouting groups and others the basic skills needed to participate in more formal citizen monitoring programs.

This event is being hosted by the Delta Science Center and East Bay Regional Park District from 10 a.m. to noon.

For more information see the Delta Science Center website at www.deltasciencecenter.org.  Additional information about WWMC can be found online at www.MonitorWater.org. 


AFRI Science Days
     Local high school students will put classroom theory into practice, thanks to a grant provided through the Delta Science Center, USDA, UC Berkeley and UC Davis.
     The program allows students to investigate rice culture in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to mitigate past agricultural impacts, improve water quality and sequester carbon. The first part of the program will be held at a special science fair exhibit for Freedom    High School science classes on Feb. 20 and 21.
     The initial part of the program will allow all of the school’s science classes plus agriculture and AP Economics classes to visit various displays on the program and an overview of the universities’ studies. A group of 30 students from various Freedom High School science classes including chemistry, environmental studies, Freedom High School’s Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM), as well as AP economics will then participate in various hands-on studies throughout the next three years. A group of students from the school’s AP Video class will also work on a series of short videos of the program that can be shared with other science classrooms throughout the Delta on the project.
     The Delta Science Center is also working on building a Learning Lab within the Oakley and Bethel Island area. The lab would include a small rice-growing field that would allow students follow the process of local rice production.
     At the science fair at Freedom, the students will be learning about water quality on the rice field including biological effects, subsidence and other environmental impacts, carbon dynamics involving carbon emissions, agronomy, agriculture, rice farming, farming economics, mercury studies, hydrology models, methane and greenhouse gases, and levee history throughout the Delta.

Delta Science Center's Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Calendars are being delivered to classrooms


Each year the Delta Science Center puts together a calendar that features information and facts that relate to the 5th grade school curriculum. The calendar also features full color pictures from local photographers who have donated their art to be used in the calendar. At this time the DSC is currently delivering the calendars, free of charge, to 5th graders from Martinez to Discovery Bay and Rio Vista to Clarksburg. A total of approximately 7,100 students in all.

The full color format of a calendar gives students a chance to see the beauty of the Delta, while the information covered on each month gives a brief description of areas of study from wind power and how it relates to the Delta, to mercury levels in the Delta left over from the Gold Rush Days, to information about the Zooplankton that live in the Delta water. There are also three vocabulary words each month related to the topic of the month. A new feature to this year's calendar DSC is the added Delta endangered species section with a full color picture and species details. 

Delivered along with the calendar was information on the Teacher Resource Guide and how teachers can further educate their students on the Delta. Each month the DSC will post learning assignments on this website that correspond with the information in the Delta. The guide comes with a reading and writing assignment related to the subject. Vocabulary and spelling words, history lessons, science projects and even a game or two. Each month a new subject will be posted. They are easily downloaded and printed for the students to use. All of the Guide's chapters are part of the school's standards and benchmarks program and designed with the help of elementary school teachers and other education sources. 

Delta Science Center wins Dow Chemical grant for in-classroom programs

The Delta Science Center received a $5,000 grant from Dow Chemical of Pittsburg to help pay for materials needed to bring the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta to the classroom. The Delta Science Center has developed a program where they will bring Delta fish, plankton, plants and other species into the classroom. The program also includes Delta water sampling and testing. The grant will be used to pay for microscopes and plankton nets. In-Classroom programs will begin again in January 2013. Teachers who would like the DSC to come to their classrooms can e-mail rgehlke@deltasciencecenter.com . Classroom programs are available free of charge and are set on a first come-first served basis. 

Big Break Visitor Center on the Delta opens at Big Break Regional Shoreline Park in Oakley

November 2012—It has been more than 15 years in the making for East Bay Regional Park District to finally cut the ribbon on the 5,000 square foot building at the Big Break Regional Shoreline Park. The building boost a science classroom/lab, conference room and an area where future displays featuring the Sacrament0-San Joaquin Delta. 

There have been lots of questions about when the Delta Science Center (DSC) will begin hosting classroom tours on site. Right now the DSC is waiting for the East Bay Regional Park District open the park for tours. The display area within the new building has not completed construction. Once that area is complete the District will open the building up for our use. This will probably take place sometime in the Spring of 2013.  Once the DSC hears that we are open to hold dates we will post information and inform local schools.