May 23, 2008
John Jay High School in Cross River
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John Jay envirothon team goes on to states
John Jay High School students know their environmental science, and can prove it — on April 29, a team of students from John Jay took home first place at the 17th annual Hudson Valley Regional Envirothon, beating out 38 teams from around the area to go on to the state competition last Wednesday and Thursday. The five-student team, coached by their Advanced Placement environmental science teacher, Dr. Linda Burke, defied their own expectations to bring home the regional championship.
“We came in thinking we didn’t have a shot,” senior Dan Barson told The Ledger. “We came in saying we’re going to have some fun, and come back and tell the juniors what they can expect next year — and then we ended up getting first place.”
John Jay took two teams to the event, both composed of students who had taken or were taking Dr. Burke’s class. The first-place team included seniors Erin Knapp, Eliza Mutino, Alex Brody, Connor Hershkowitz, and Dan Barson. The second team was composed of juniors Courtney McCarthy and Daniel Perret as well as seniors Lily Appelbaum, Thomas Flynn and Hannah Levy. Junior Caitlin Fischetti and senior Meredith Juliana were brought as alternate team members, but were able to compete on teams made up of alternates from different schools.
For the state championships, Lily joined the team, replacing Dan, who was unable to attend.
During the Envirothon, the students had to participate in five different areas: soils, aquatics, forestry, wildlife, and current environmental issues in outdoor recreation. Much of the competition involved identification of different items, including tree diseases, animal tracks or soil types. The teams were then ranked by their combined scores.
Students also had to prepare a problem-solving presentation for the judges, showing how they would go about resolving issues around a hypothetical preserve.
“Most of the weekend before it we spent working on our presentation,” said Erin. “They gave us a fictional piece of land, that we had to figure out what to do with.”
The students had to weigh different competing interests, such as hikers and developers, and make decisions on how to manage the land for their presentation. The same problem was posed for the state championships, and the team members have spent the intervening time improving and reworking their presentation for that competition. The winner of the state competition, which includes delegates from 58 other regional tournaments, will go on to compete in Canon National Envirothon at the end of July.
“We have been studying very, very hard for the past few weeks and hope to do very well, our big goal being the national competition in Flagstaff, Ariz.,” said Eliza, the only member of the team who competed last year. “It is an outstanding experience, and I think John Jay will continue to be a strong team in the future.”
© Copyright 2008 by Hersam Acorn Newspapers
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