EUSD students begin SWPPP work funded by $700,000 grant

Students at three Encinitas Union School District (EUSD) sites — La Costa Heights, El Camino Creek and Flora Vista — met this week with a topographic survey team to begin the design and construction of three significant stormwater-related projects.

These projects were designed by students as part of the 2014 Stormwater Pollution Prevention Plan (SWPPP), and put together well enough to earn the large Drought Response Outreach Program for School (DROPS) grant from the California Stormwater Quality Association.

The SWPPP Internship Program is an annual yearlong, science-based program, which guides fifth and sixth grade students to produce a SWPPP plan for their school site. The school year is divided into three sections: education and research; data collection, evaluation and Best Management Practice (BMP) design; and BMP implementation, plan completion and presentation.

Currently, the SWPPP Internship Program is being offered at all nine EUSD elementary schools, with more than 200 students actively involved in reducing the amount of pollution flowing into our local waterways.

This year, many of the schools will be implementing their SWPPP BMPs to reduce pollutants from flowing into the school site storm drains. These BMPs include the projects with funding from the DROPS grant.

Over the next two years, the SWPPP interns will be involved with every phase of the projects. They began this week when professionals from ATC Design Group and Webb Cleff Architecture met with the interns to explain the topographic survey and maps process, then took them out and to show them how a survey is conducted.

Going forward, the projects will move to the final design stage, the preparation of bid documents, the selection of a construction contractor, the construction of the projects, the education of the school and local community and the ongoing monitoring and maintenance.