The Friday before spring break, UNC and AP environmental science students presented their air particulate projects. CU Boulder donated air particulate pods to each group of students to help them test and confirm or deny their hypotheses. 

One group of students, Hailey Ratliff, Cody Gesick, and Evan Bowers, was curious about the cleanliness of the floors at Greeley West High School and proposed the theory that the dirtiest places at the school are going to be where people are the most. “We tested particulate matter from running on surfaces inside. We ran on nine surfaces and tested each surface nine times at three speeds,” said Gesick

This theory ended up being false, either because the areas that are most traveled are cleaned the most or because people walk around the most, picking up dirt from the floors. Thus, there was not much particulate matter found during testing.

The project has major ties to the class work being done while adding an interesting spin to learning. “We are in environmental science, so we learn about how humans impact air quality and the world around us. We did this by testing what dust and dirt is around the school to see how humans impacted indoor areas,” Said Ratliff

 Students were given the freedom of picking their own hypotheses. Some of these are about the air particulates when doing an oil change on a car and how the strength of the smell of a cologne affects the amounts of particulate matter.