Budding reporters

In the year 2020, the CNR Institute of Marine Science and the National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology, in collaboration with other CNR institutes (IBE, IFC, IPFC, ICCOM) have carried out several projects aimed at raising awareness of the problem of the increasing presence of anthropogenic objects, especially plastic, in the marine environment.

Among them, in May 2020, in the middle of the lock down period from COVID 19, a citizen science project named "Walking on the Tracks of the Sea," proposed and designed by ISMAR-CNR, was launched. The project, among other things, aimed to carry out virtual data collection through questionnaires addressed to citizens on three different topics: water consumption, consumption of fresh seafood and consumption/habits regarding plastic material objects, in the particular historical phase of the first lock down from COVID 19. Preliminary results obtained from these online questionnaires have been made public within the website.

Budding Chroniclers is a citizen science project, which is related to the "Walking in the Footsteps of the Sea" project, and exclusively targets students in "Pathways for Transversal Skills and Orientation" (PCTO) mode. Students are directly involved in collecting data, in the form of a "survey" conducted by them in the entourage of their acquaintances, family, friends, etc., regarding the problem of plastic in the sea. The project is carried out remotely to comply with the rules imposed by the health emergency.

This PCTO project aims to raise awareness of the contents of the "Plastic and Us" Exhibition held inside the Museum of Natural History of the University of Pisa (Calci). In fact, the students participated in the remote virtual visit of the exhibition and used the questionnaires (in a more extended form) made within the project "Walking on the Tracks of the Sea" proposing them to their family members/friends/acquaintances, thus realizing themselves their own personal "inquiry" on the topic of "knowledge, use, abuse and possible environmental damage of plastic."

The course involved, for the students, acquiring data and new knowledge related to the problem of poor plastic disposal, and becoming aware of what are the most appropriate behaviors to adopt to try to solve it.

At the end of the survey, the students compared themselves with their peers, grouped together all the responses obtained and reflected on the results obtained.