Esri Announces Winners of the Visualize Your Water Quality Challenge

High School Students Raise Awareness for Watershed Health with Story
Maps

REDLANDS, Calif.–(BUSINESS WIRE)–#EPA—Esri
joins the US Environmental Protection Agency and the US Geological
Survey in congratulating the winners of the Visualize
Your Water Quality high school citizen science challenge. In the
challenge, students from 13 US states used Esri geographic information
system (GIS) software and open water-quality datasets to investigate
nutrient pollution in their local watershed—raising awareness for issues
affecting areas from the Chesapeake Bay to the Great Lakes region.

Visualize Your Water Quality is part of the White House Office of
Science and Technology Policy’s Nutrient
Sensor Challenge. This effort builds on the Open Water Data
Initiative’s mission to make water datasets more accessible for better
management of this valuable resource. Students involved in this
challenge created story maps using Esri ArcGIS Online.

Here are the winners of this year’s Visualize Your Water Quality
challenge

• National Grand Prize—Understanding
  Eutrophication in the Chesapeake Bay (Washington-Lee High
  School, Virginia)
• Chesapeake Bay Regional Prize—Nutrient
  Pollution, the Bay’s Biggest Threat (Poolesville High
  School, Maryland)
• Great Lakes Regional Prize—Algae
  Affliction of Lake Erie (Father Gabriel Richard High
  School, Michigan)
• National Geographic Prize—Eutrophication
  in the Chesapeake Bay: Fertilizer and Manure (Washington-Lee
  High School, Virginia)
• Honorable Mention—The
  Chesapeake Bay: A National Treasure in Trouble (Poolesville
  High School, Maryland)
• Honorable Mention—The
  Bonds of Water (Poolesville High School, Maryland)

“The winning story maps show that students weighed carefully various
elements in a complex issue and put serious study into making the data
intelligible,” said Charlie Fitzpatrick, Esri education manager. “This
is the power of geographic thinking: thoughtful analyses of data and
careful presentations of patterns and relationships in ways that clarify
complex situations.”

The grand prize winner will be awarded $2,500 and an invitation to
attend the Esri Education Conference in San Diego, California, June
25–26, 2016. The schools winning the Chesapeake Bay and Great Lakes
Regional prizes will each be awarded $2,500. National Geographic has
selected a National Geographic Prize winner, who will receive a copy of
the National Geographic Atlas of the World. All six
winning visualizations will be published in Esri’s Mapping the Nation
book.

Any US K–12 school can receive a no-cost ArcGIS
Online school account from Esri to be used in conjunction with
President Barack Obama’s ConnectED
Initiative.

For more information on Esri’s education program, visit esri.com/education.

About Esri

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think and plan geographically. The market leader in GIS technology, Esri
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than 7,000 colleges and universities. Esri applications, running on more
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provide the backbone for the world’s mapping and spatial analysis. Esri
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Contacts

Esri
Karen Richardson
909-793-2853, extension 1-3491
press@esri.com