VGCC Earth Day festivals feature student projects
Vance-Granville Community College held Earth Day festivals on April 22 on the college’s Main Campus in Vance County and South Campus in Granville County. At both locations, students competed with one another to create projects to educate attendees about various environmental issues. Alongside student exhibits were informative displays, works of art and demonstrations related to science, nature and sustainability, provided by college faculty and community members. Meanwhile, the second annual Earth Day “Fun Run/Walk” took place on Main Campus, promoting healthy exercise along with a healthy planet.
In the student project contest at Main Campus, Svetlana O’Hara of Louisburg took home the top prize for her project on the environmental impact on the use of hormones and antibiotics in meat production. Zenaia Champion of Warrenton won the second-place prize for studying the differing environmental effects of growing plants indoors and outdoors. Becky Anderson of Henderson placed third with her project on the nutritional benefits of golden rice. All three winners are students in the Associate in Science (College Transfer) program. Along with student projects from Science and English classes, several VGCC departments also contributed to the event, including Automotive Systems Technology , Bioprocess Technology , Pharmacy Technology , and Adult Basic Skills . Festival-goers sampled French organic vegetarian stew prepared by VGCC Culinary Arts students. The VGCC Learning Resources Center (LRC) displayed materials in the library’s collection related to the environment and climate change. Guests participating in the event included the Backyard Plantation Nursery of Oxford, beekeeper Jimmy Chalmers of Oxford, the Granville County-based Biofuels Center of North Carolina, N.C. Parks & Recreation, N.C. Forest Service, American Wildlife Refuge of Rolesville, the Future Farmers of America from Southern Vance High School, Studio Mainstreet, Sunset Slush, N.C. Cooperative Extension, N.C. State University students and Granville County Greenway Plan Committee.
At VGCC’s South Campus , located between Creedmoor and Butner, students could compete as individuals or in groups to create Earth Day-themed posters. Taking first place in the contest was a group of Radiography students, whose display was called “The Choice is Yours” and proclaimed that “you don’t need an X-ray to see what’s happening” to the planet. The second-place winner was Ashley Walker of Oxford, a student in instructor Frankie Frink’s English class whose subject was pollution. Third place went to a poster on the Amazon rain forest by students from instructor Jason Bryan’s English class, including Morgan Milligan of Bullock, Margaret Brown of Wake Forest, Shalondra Brown of Oxford and Jade Russell of Oxford. The fourth-place winner was another student from Frink’s class, Melissa Cummings of Oxford, whose poster concerned Solar Energy. Guests at South Campus included Metech Recycling of Creedmoor, Deborah Brogden/Creedmoor’s Farmers Market, Grammie’s Kitchen, Granville County Soil and Water Conservation, Granville Greenways, Granville Farms, Judith Alston, Suzanne Edney, Laura Keith/Curves of Creedmoor, Rob Montague of the N.C. Forest Service, Robert Hendrick from Rail Yard Studios, Teresa Baker of Granville County Schools, Bailey Newton of Triple B Farms, North Carolina American Water Works Association and the North Carolina Water Environment Association (NC AWWA-WEA), and Carl J. Cantaluppi of N.C. Cooperative Extension.
Pictured above, in top picture: From left, Becky Anderson of Henderson, Zenaia Champion of Warrenton and Svetlana O’Hara of Louisburg won the third, second and first-place prizes, respectively, in the Earth Day student project contest at VGCC’s Main Campus. (VGCC photo)
Pictured above, in bottom picture: A group of Radiography students won the Earth Day poster contest at VGCC’s South Campus. They included, kneeling from left, Makiesha Dickson of Louisburg, Jena Talley of Oxford and Sara Dockum of Wake Forest; and standing from left, John Geist of Wake Forest, Linda Kennedy of Oxford, Kelvin Pennell of Oxford and Erin Edwards of Franklinton; not pictured: Elizabeth Hill of Durham.
