Students enrolled in this class will have the opportunity to participate in a chloride monitoring project undertaken by the City of Winona during this semester.  The City will be participating in the Izaak Walton League's Winter Salt Watch program (https://www.iwla.org/water/stream-monitoring/winter-salt-watch), specifically monitoring the discharge of road de-icing salts (various chlorides) from City storm sewers into Lake Winona.  Chlorides potentially could be discharged through storm sewers any time snow melts during periodic warm winter days, or during normal spring snowmelt and rainfall runoff.

City staff would like WSU students to monitor the storm sewers that discharge to Lake Winona all around the lake's perimeter.  During all snowmelt or rainfall periods this semester, students will collect water samples from storm sewers discharging into the lake and use special chloride test strips to determine the chloride content of those water samples.

Requirements

1) Students will be assigned a specific storm sewer to monitor, either individually or in small groups.  Students will monitor the same storm sewer discharge throughout the semester.  The City of Winona will provide students with chloride test strips, and WSU will provide water collection bottles.

2) Throughout the winter and spring, students will collect a storm sewer discharge water sample during each snowmelt or rainfall event.  The instructor will monitor local weather conditions and notify students when they should collect samples.

3) Students will maintain a log of their sample efforts, including location, date, and time of samples and the chloride test result for each sample.  Logs will be maintained by students until they are asked to submit them to the instructor for collating.

4) Students participating in this project will receive 100 points class credit following completion of their sampling efforts, submission of their data, and submission of a report describing the group and class results. The instructor reserves the right to reduce the number of points awarded based on student participation and performance during the project.

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