Environmental Internship Program - 2023 Booklet

Maxwel Lee ’26
ELECTRICAL AND COMPUTER ENGINEERING
WATER AND THE
ENVIRONMENT
PROJECT TITLE
StreamWatch Water
Quality Monitoring
Program
ORGANIZATION(S)
The Watershed Institute
LOCATION(S)
Pennington, New Jersey
MENTOR(S)
Erin Stretz,
Assistant Director of
Science and Stewardship,
The Watershed Institute;
Jian Smith, StreamWatch
Program Coordinator, The
Watershed Institute
I worked with the StreamWatch program,
a program at The Watershed Institute that
collects data on the water quality of freshwater
ecosystems in central New Jersey. As part of the
program, weekly tests are performed for E. coli,
turbidity, chloride, nitrate, and orthophosphate,
providing insight into the overall health
of the local aquatic ecosystem. My project
centered around mapping the collected data
in the software ArcGIS to create an interactive
dashboard that presented the data for each of
the 60 sites in an easily understandable manner
on The Watershed Institute’s main website.
The dashboard will be utilized to educate local
communities about the health of various water
bodies in New Jersey, helping to raise awareness
about the severity of harmful algal blooms and
the importance of monitoring aquatic health.
During my internship, I also had the pleasure of
helping educate people on water pollution issues
during the annual Butterfly Festival. It was very
rewarding to teach people about all the work I
undertook throughout the summer.
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