Employee profile: Jean Smith
Furman
Forum
What has hosting the South Carolina Governor's School for the Arts and
Humanities meant to Furman?
Around
campus:
News from university departments
Faculty/Staff
news:
Professional activities
Milestones:
New employess, promotions, anniversaries
InsideFurman is published monthly during the school year by the Furman University Department of Marketing and Public Relations. For story ideas, e-mail John Roberts, editor.
Students, faculty undertake
three-year study of Upstate water
Furman has received three grants to help fund a comprehensive study that will gauge the impact of the Upstate’s rapid development on the region’s water quality.
The study, which began this summer and will take three years to complete, involves seven faculty members and at least 20 students who will contrast water quality with land-use patterns in portions of five Upstate counties. The results of the comprehensive project will be turned over to the South Carolina Department of Health and Environmental Control. DHEC will eventually pass the data along to state, county and municipal governments and other bodies that develop land use laws, says Ken Sargent, Earth and Environmental Sciences professor.
The grants, totaling $205,640, came from the National Science Foundation ($107,900) and the Environmental Protection Agency ($59,040 and $40,300). Furman matched the grants with $111,460, bringing the total funding to $317,100.
New industry and residential construction can have a profound impact on water quality. Some industries may discharge treated waste into streams and rivers while housing subdivisions, roads and parking lots decrease the amount of filters such as grass, brush and trees that can help to clean water naturally.
The clearing of water-absorbing pastures, farmland and woodlands also create conditions for flooding, which can have an adverse effect on water quality.
Sargent says students from the departments of Biology, Chemistry and Earth and Environmental Sciences will gather and analyze hundreds of water samples for biological and chemical content during the course of the study.
"The thing that is unique about this study is its size and the fact that it is multi-disciplinary. It involves more than one area of study," he says.
.
Students Allen Mitchum (left), Angela Horner (center) and Candice Cuddy (right) study wildlife taken from the Enoree Watershed near Mauldin with Biology professor Wade Worthen as part of a three-year study of the Upstate’s water supply.