When Rebecca Wattleworth's students come into her classroom “they often do not realize the impact they have on the environment with their everyday activities," she said. "They think when they throw it away, litter, etc. (that) it is just gone. Out of sight, out of mind."
School teachers from across Illinois are learning about the risks of improper disposal of pharmaceuticals and personal care products (PPCPs) and the impacts of these emerging contaminants on the environment during a workshop Wednesday and Thursday, June 15 and 16, at the Illinois Sustainable Technology Center (ISTC), a division of the Prairie Research Institute at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.
Wattleworth, a veteran teacher at Decatur's Warrensburg-Latham High School, said she enrolled in the PPCP teacher workshop so she is prepared to show her students that their actions have consequences. "I want my students to learn that their everyday activities will have an impact in some way on the environment and that they need to be making better/safer choices for both the environment and us!"
Geoffrey Freymuth, a science teacher at Jefferson Middle School in Champaign, is attending the workshop to develop activities for his science enrichment class, as well as for the school's student Green Team. "It has been my experience that students can have a great impact on the behaviors of their families and their habits," he said. "I would like my students to be able to set up and design a local campaign on the issue or even find a way to test/evaluate local waters etc.," he added.
Joni White, a science instructor at Urbana High School said "As an environmental science teacher, I am well aware that this is an often overlooked problem that seriously impacts the environment. I am eager to learn more about what is being done about it so that I can communicate its importance to my students." She added "From a personal perspective, I am also a veterinarian and well aware of the medical field issue of pharmaceuticals ending up in the water supply."
The workshops are a joint effort of ISTC and Illinois-Indiana Sea Grant Program funded by a grant from the U of I Extension.
The intent of the workshops is to build awareness of the hazards that unused and unwanted medications pose. They account for accidental poisonings and drug abuse and for environmental problems when these chemicals enter the environment through improper disposal. The workshops will help this information about PPCPs become a part of each school’s curriculum, according to Nancy Holm, ISTC assistant director. “There are a number of sources of PPCPs to the environment but reducing as much improper disposal as possible is a step in the right direction.”
Recent studies reflect the growing concern about how these compounds enter the aquatic environment and their effects on wildlife.
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Salmon in Puget Sound (Seattle) were found to be contaminated with antidepressants, pain killers, anti-inflammatants, fungicides, antiseptics, anticoagulants, and antibiotics. A total of 81 PPCP chemicals from nicotine and caffeine to OxyContin and cocaine.
“This is a threat to public health and also the health of our ecosystems that every family has a direct role in preventing,” Holm added. “By providing this information to teachers they can then present this information to hundreds of students each year who can work to spread the word in their communities.”
“One of the activities in the curriculum will encourage students to work in their community to set up a collection box program for the public to dispose of unused and unwanted pharmaceuticals and to bring more awareness of this issue to the public,” added Beth Meschewski, resource specialist at ISTC and one of the organizers of the workshops. “We want students to see that they can be effective in making change happen and make a difference with this problem,” she said. “Here in Champaign-Urbana, there are 24/7 medicine drop boxes at the city police stations and at the U of I police station.”