SCIENCE IS IN THE AIR

In the midst of a climate crisis, the youth’s mobilization for the environment is a key challenge. The hopes of a better future for our planet rest largely on the shoulders of this young generation. If we are already noticing the effects of climatic change, tomorrow’s adults will be heavily impacted by its consequences. It appears then crucial to condition our children, from the earliest age to a citizen and environmental conscience.

Education and awareness are therefore privileged tools. The “Calisph’Air” educational project, led by CNES since 1995, also shares this ambition. Supported by teachers from primary to secondary school, it enables pupils to take local air quality measurements and compare them with satellite data.

In support of this educational initiative, Véronique Pont, in charge of the SOAC-DC master’s degree at the Toulouse Paul Sabatier University, interviewed the pupils of the Jacques Mauré middle school of Castelginest (31), on Thursday, March 10, 2022.

The lecturer held a first theoretical session on air pollution to help the students analyze the measurements they have carried out before within the framework of the Calisph’Air project. The pupils observed the collected atmospheric depositions, obtained with homemade collectors, to analyze the evolution of rain levels over the course of a month. Small quantities of this collected water were then examined under the microscope, to better understand how rain events can account for the atmospheric content.

In the second time, Veronique Pont contributed to explaining the obtained results with the children, to allow them to give back their knowledge in the field of pollution.

The primary objective of these interventions was to “familiarize students with the pollutants that can affect them in their everyday lives” says the lecturer. But its ambition extends to a broader challenge:  a cross-generational and collective shift of the stakes of today’s and tomorrow’s world.

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