Award Winners

Congratulations to Sandie Nichols and James Island Middle School for being the recipient of the 2009 Donna Bates Award!

Sandie Nichols’ fifth period science class working on the "Trash Hurts" project, James Island Middle School.

The 2009 Donna Bates Award, an award that began in 2006 in "an effort to encourage improvement and support of coastal science and coastal environment instructions in the eight coastal counties of South Carolina," was awarded to Sandie Nichols.  Nichols, a sixth grade science teacher at James Island Middle School, was recognized for her project entitled, "Trash Hurts," which called for students to take neighborhood surveys in order to determine the amount of vehicle litter being released into the coastal region.  The $2,000 grant, awarded to the school and Nichols by SCDHEC’s Office of Ocean and Coastal Recource Management and in partnership with COSEE SouthEast, will allow students to address the vehicle litter problem directly by designing, producing and distributing trash receptable bags that will hang from the back of vehicle seats. To view SCDHEC’s official press release on the 2009 Donna Bates Award, please visit http://www.scdhec.gov/administration/news/2009/nr20090114-01.htm