Cups of purple water sit before tables of students in a room at Plymouth Bluff Environmental Center.
Baking soda is added and mixed by camp leaders to one of the cups of homemade pH indicator at each table, made from cabbage steeped in boiled water, and it shifts from a neutral purple to a bright blue, indicating the pH of a base.
Students eventually get in on the action, using straws to blow into each table’s fourth cup, mirroring the addition of carbon dioxide that happens in the ocean and causing the water to shift to a more acidic lighter purple.
“It was fun,” Collin Carter, a 12-year-old student at Columbus Christian Academy, said Thursday. “The main (new thing) that I learned about in the pH experiment was that carbon dioxide is slightly acidic.”
This lesson was just one of several activities that nearly 30 children participated in this week at Mississippi University for Women’s science camp. The camp returned for its third year with a new theme of environmental science, which is one of camp director and biology professor Michael Dodson’s areas of focus, he said.
“We wanted to give them new things to do, not recycle different activities that we’ve done in the past,” Dodson said. “Almost every activity that we did this year was brand new for the students.”
Campers this week also looked at river water under a microscope, went on trail walks to identify different plants and leaves discussed in the classroom and got to do an egg drop with crash pads made from materials found outside.
The camp not only had MUW faculty leading but also got some MUW students involved, including senior biology major Ethan Wilkins. He was glad to get campers outside learning about the science behind the environment, he said.
“I just love the idea of getting kids exposed to the outdoors,” Wilkins said. “… I think it’s a great opportunity in the summer, because you’re able to expose them to that, and maybe they can continue that education, back in school.”
Sydney Thornton, a 14-year-old home-schooled student from Starkville, said she was excited to return for her third year at the camp and to learn more about science, which is her favorite subject in school.
“It has been fun, but I also like that they teach it at different levels,” Thornton said. “They do keep it easy, but then they’ll also talk to me about more advanced stuff.”
Carter, who had also been to the camp previously, made friends with some of the campers this year and thought the instructors did a great job with the lessons, he said.
“It kind of went into the lessons and the scientific terms in a fun way,” Carter said.
The camp is expected to return with funding already in place for next year, Dodson said.
“It’s been a great experience, both for us as well as for the students,” Dodson said. “… We are definitely planning on having it again.”
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