A multimillion dollar grant will allow UWindsor researchers to continue closely monitoring the health of the Great Lakes coastal wetlands and collaborating with scientists based around them.

The United States Environmental Protection Agency granted $10 million to the Great Lakes Coastal Wetlands Monitoring Program. The program’s Canadian arm, headed by UWindsor biology professor Jan Ciborowski, will receive $1.9 million, with half staying at UWindsor. This is a second five-year commitment from the agency through the Great Lakes Restoration Initiative.

“What is most amazing is the size of this collaboration,” says Dr. Ciborowski. “There are 50 lead scientists working together to collect and interpret data from across the whole Great Lakes—information that doesn’t just sit on our computers, but is shared and used by municipal, state and provincial agencies in a way that was previously unimaginable.”

Windsor is the only Canadian university in the project and joins other Canadian members, Bird Studies Canada and the Canadian Wildlife Service. The massive project, led by professor Donald Uzarski of Central Michigan University, includes contributions from North American based scientists, researchers, institutions and agencies that border the lakes.

The funding pays for teams across the Great Lakes basin to sample fish, invertebrates, birds, amphibians, plants and water quality. More than 1200 coastal wetlands are visited on a five-year cyclical basis. Areas being restored, or of special community interest, are deemed benchmark sites and visited every year.

Researchers collect, analyze and upload data into a central location on the Great Lakes Coastal Wetland Monitoring Project website. The site contains maps with a colour coding system indicating whether an area or its plants and animals are considered healthy.

“Our researchers have classified whole areas as doing better, the same or worse, and this information is readily available on the website,” Ciborowski says. “It’s a grand and unifying idea because we can compare what is happening in different areas and determine if the patterns of change are local or regional issues.”

Ciborowski says the group is mapping wetlands that are at risk of becoming unhealthy by considering how much environmental stress an area can tolerate before the fish, bird, invertebrate or plant community may start to deteriorate.

“We look at different types of thresholds, like when sensitive species start to disappear, or when hardier, pollution tolerant species may start dominating resources, or how much agriculture a particular watershed can sustain without putting the biological community at risk,” says Ciborowski.

The monitoring data gets a second life, says Ciborowski, when American and Canadian agencies—like the US EPA, Environment Canada, Ontario’s environment ministry, or the Essex Region Conservation Authority—want to identify areas at risk and start conservation or restoration programs.

UWindsor’s field teams are led by Joseph Gathman, an associate professor at University of Wisconsin River Falls and former postdoctoral fellow at Windsor.

“Our field teams of graduate students and undergraduate research assistants have a tight timeline of two days at each location to sample invertebrates, fishes, plants and water,” says Ciborowski. “Colleagues from Bird Studies Canada visit each wetland several times in early spring to assess the birds and amphibians.”

The Canadian teams sample coastal wetlands on the Canadian side of lakes Ontario, Erie, and Huron, as well as the Detroit River, Lake St. Clair, St. Clair River, St. Marys River and the U.S. side of western Lake Erie. This round of funding wraps up in September of 2020.

Ciborowski says the success of projects like this relies on collaboration and communication across institutions.

“Problems of this scale are so big that no individual institution can hope to address them,” he says. “Environmental stress operates across political boundaries, and this project has the scope to let us look at the problems and restoration strategies holistically.”

Like athletes suiting up for competition, high schoolers strapped on their goggles, buttoned up their lab coats, and pulled on their rubber gloves Friday with a mindset to win the Science Olympiad. Approximately 190 students from grades 11 and 12 from 18 local high schools came together to compete at the University of Windsor on Friday.

The Science Olympiad, hosted by the Faculty of Science, consisted of teams racing from one event after the other, with a restricted time limit. The teams challenged each other in subjects including: chemistry, physics, environmental science, general science and computer science.

“There’s a lot of entertaining and engaging events happening throughout the day in the Science Olympiad. It opens the students to many areas of science that they can choose in post-secondary study,” said Michelle Bondy, outreach program coordinator in the Faculty of Science.

The Science Pursuit event was a common favourite; students raced to different buildings around campus to do small science activities that they were scored on. These activities involved forensics, a design challenge, biology and math.

“Every member on the team has their own specialty. Everyone has to work together using their strengths so you can have one fully functional excellent team,” said Emily Ma from Tecumseh Vista Academy.

The IQ quiz divided the team members up, which made them aware of their strong suits and weaker aspects.

“I didn’t know some of the questions but my teammates did,” said Ma.

Team members worked together at the Eyeball Benders event, where they had to look at zoomed-in photos to identify the objects.

“The Science Olympiad is challenging and fun and is testing the students’ science knowledge,” said Bondy. “Overall, it’s an enriching experience for them.”

A team from Vincent Massey Secondary School finished atop the 2015 Science Olympiad, winning scholarships worth $1,200 each to study science at the University of Windsor. This scholarship from the Provost’s Office was originally $1,000 but was increased by generous sponsorship from the University of Windsor Alumni Association. The Massey students also took home plaques and a trophy to display at their school until next year’s Science Olympiad.

Second-place winners didn’t go home empty-handed; they also took home plaques and each won $500 scholarships sponsored by the Faculty of Science.

—article and photo by Dana Attalla

The greater the commitment to a project, the greater its chances for success, says Sandra Riccio-Muglia. The new director of events and programs for the CAW Student Centre, she invites students to bring her their ideas for activities on campus.

“Think outside of the box. I want students to think of something fun they would want to go to themselves,” she says. “The more they love something, the more it will succeed.”

Riccio-Muglia is ready to help students organize and plan events for clubs, facilities, and groups.

“Students can come to me for anything from planning to brainstorming, or for marketing ideas, new ideas, and different concepts,” she says, although her focus is on the student centre. “I want to make it a centralized hub, put on events through clubs. I want to make students enjoy on-site fun and entertainment that help Lancers increase their pride.”

She says her 14 years of experience planning events through her own business, Magic Closet Theme Parties, offers a valuable background to her current position.

“I think that the experience I have is unique to the city. Events in the past have been my own that I have made,” says Riccio-Muglia. “I want to create things nobody else has done but something that someone would want to be involved in.”

She believes in the mantra “Love what you do, do what you love” and invites students to contact her at any time, at studentcentre@uwindsor.ca; 519-253-3000, ext. 3230; or in her office, room 237, CAW Student Centre.

—article and photo by Lauren Gauthier