Students “cap” off senior year

Created individual projects

Students in the Natural Resources and Agricultural Science (NRAS) program here at North Harford are required to take a class related to their area of study each year. Seniors are required to take the Capstone class. In this class, students must create an experiment, conduct it, record the data and prepare a poster to showcase at Capstone Night where people can view the data generated.

“We have invited Board of Education members, people from the central office, local politicians and members of the Agriculture community to Capstone night,” stated Mr. Greg Murrell, head of the NRAS program.

For students in the NRAS program, the Capstone class is required in order to graduate.

“For the posters to be printed, we want it to be as perfect as possible….” stated Ms. Jacqueline Smith, one of the teachers who works with students in the capstone class. “The students then must have the poster to participate in Capstone Night, and Capstone Night is mandatory.”

The NRAS program is split into three separate strands, the Animal Strand , Plant Strand, and The Natural Resources strand.

“I studied the effect of different light intensities on the growth rate of broiler chicks,” stated senior Patrick Huff, a student in the Animal Strand.

In his experiment, Huff had three groups of ten chicks, with one group placed under artificial light the entire time, one placed outside or in natural light the entire time, and one group placed under artificial light half the time and under natural light the other half.

“I was really surprised with the results. The ones that had both types of light were the smallest, and the artificial light in the other group made them the biggest,” stated Huff.

One experiment conducted by senior Jordan Borkoski in the Plant strand was a soil analysis about where white turtlehead plants grow.

“I had people collect samples from where white turtlehead plants are known to grow, and I collected samples across Maryland to get a profile of where they grow,” stated Borkowki. “So far I’ve learned that white turtle heads prefer an average 6.9 pH, silt loam soil texture, one ppm(parts per million) of phosphorous, and one ppm of potassium.”

Finally, senior Katie Soltysiak of the Natural Resources strand created a map of North Harford’s wetland.
“I constructed a GIS map of the North Harford wetland and to provide waste water treatment plant employees with a navigation source and data reference,” stated Soltysiak. “Then I performed a delineation of the North Harford wetland to evaluate its hydric soils, hydrophilic plants and hydrology. My results confirmed the wetland was an authentic wetland under the Clean Water Act under section 404.”