We’re so grateful to the Royal Society of Chemistry for awarding us a grant to pilot the Kingfishers: school freshwater champions project in eight schools across the South West. This project is a citizen science project focusing around engaging young people with water quality and the health of our streams and rivers.

Why is it important?

Our health, and the health of the flora and fauna that live in and around streams and rivers are fundamentally connected. There are so many health benefits of spending time in and around water but water pollution is a growing issue both globally and in England. 2023 was the worst year on record for storm water pollution, with storm overflows spilling into England’s rivers and seas for over 3.6 million hours.

Pollution can come from many sources including contaminated runoff (both agricultural and urban), poor domestic plumbing and increased rainfall resulting in sewage systems being overwhelmed. Nutrient pollution (particularly nitrates and phosphates) can reduce the oxygen carrying capacity of the water and speed up the growth of the certain plants. All types of pollution result in dramatic loss of biodiversity in our streams and rivers.

We want to educate and empower young people to play a role in monitoring, better understanding and tackling freshwater pollution. Citizen science can provide really valuable insights into changes in water quality and ecosystem health. Alongside this, we hope to encourage young people to spend time in nature and foster a passion to protect it.

School Freshwater Champions

This project began when Reg Godwin, an environmental scientist with 17 years of experience in analytical chemistry, decided to run a water monitoring project with a class in his children’s school in Holsworthy, Devon. Reg spent many years working for the Environment Agency and is now an Applications Specialist for Thermo Fisher Scientific.

Reg is passionate about the value and importance of citizen science. He used Freshwater Watch water testing kits to begin regularly testing the water quality in the stream local to the school, as part of the children’s normal lessons.

The project was a great success. The lead teacher for the project said:
“The Kingfishers project allows the children to benefit from practical, real world learning and has given them insight into local water quality issues and how we can better understand water pollution. The practical, outdoor aspect combined with classroom resources means it suits a variety of teaching and learning styles, giving the children greater confidence and engagement in real life, locally relevant science. It’s so important that we continue this work and bring forward the next generation of environmental scientists with projects like Kingfishers.”

Reg reached out to us to work with him to expand this project out to more schools in the South West, bring in additional collaborators to deepen the water testing capabilities and create an education package for schools. We’re really excited to have Greenpeace on board to support with the detailed analysis of the first set of samples, as well as collaboration with Dr Garry Codling at the University of Exeter.