Serenity Kheom-Rangel (center) displays her project to State Rep. Vanna Howard (left) and Sally Farrow from Mass Audobon (Photo courtesy Jen Myers)

by Jen Myers

During his reign of terror from 1975-1979, Cambodian dictator Pol Pot, leader of the Khmer Rouge, orchestrated the systemic genocide of more than 2 million of his own people.

A half century later, the repercussions of that devastating time continue to reverberate throughout the Southeast Asian nation.

Lowell High School student Serenity Kheom-Rangel delved into the environmental impact left by the Khmer Rouge’s near-destruction of Cambodia in her research project for the Environmental Studies class she is taking through Lowell High School’s Early College partnership with Middlesex Community College.

Kheom-Rangel explained the Khmer Rouge used a variety of destructive agricultural practices in Cambodia including slash-and-burn agriculture, deforestation, and unregulated hunting that created an unstable ecosystem from which the country is still struggling to recover.

There are groups like USAID working to build better irrigation systems and increase the variety of crops grown to enhance the soil, and UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) who is working to reforest the land to build the nation’s agricultural resilience and restore wildlife to the lands.

And 50 years later, she added, there are still groups led by moms who are doing the work to dig up landmines left behind.

Kheom-Rangel said while she was upset to learn about the lingering issues facing her family’s ancestral home, there is hope in the citizens and outside forces determined to conserve natural resources and protect biodiversity in Cambodia.

“It may take time, but if you advocate you can make change,” she said.

State Representative Vanna Howard, a survivor of the Khmer Rouge Genocide, was one of the visitors who stopped to talk to Kheom-Rangel about her research.

“This is amazing, as someone who was there and survived it, I really never thought about the environmental impact,” said Howard, praising Kheom-Rangel for the amount of passion she put into the project and for her fierce curiosity.

Kheom-Rangel was one of 140-plus Lowell High School students taking Early College classes who presented their research during the January 10 Behavioral Sciences and Environmental Science Research Symposium. The event, which took place in the LHS cafeteria, gave teachers, administrators, city and state officials, and community members a chance to hear from the students about topics they are interested in, what they have learned, and what the next steps may be to solving these important issues.

Students were given the freedom to choose their topics and they were wide ranging including – the impact of having an incarcerated parent on a child, misogyny, cultural appropriation, risk taking behavior, Parkinson’s disease, the impact of social media on a young person’s brain, mercury in fish, and so much more.

Krista Cregg-Spicer and Jennifer Pinguil chose to focus their research on the foster care to prison pipeline.

Cregg-Spicer said she was interested in the topic because she spent time in the foster care system as a child, as did her dad, who subsequently was incarcerated for a period of time.

Krista Cregg Spicer (left) and Jennifer Pinguil (Photo courtesy Jen Myers)

She learned than the majority of children in foster care come from families broken by substance abuse and/or physical and verbal abuse, leaving them at a disadvantage and dealing with mental health issues and trauma due to circumstances beyond their control at an early age.

When they age out of the foster care system there are few supports available and according to Michigan-based non-profit House of Providence, 20 percent of those young people instantly become homeless. Additionally, by the age of 17, more than 50 percent of foster children have been arrested, convicted, or detained in the juvenile justice system; 70 percent of young women in foster care become pregnant before they are 21-years-old; 60 percent of foster-involved children turn to sex work; only 3 percent earn a college degree; and 25 percent suffer from PTSD.

“The statistics really surprised me, especially the 70 percent of girls getting pregnant before they are 21,” said Cregg-Spicer. “We need so many additional supports in our society.”

Zachary Austria (right) shows off his project on dynamite fishing in the Philippines (Photo courtesy Jen Myers)

Zachary Austria set his sights on his family’s homeland of The Philippines when searching out an interesting and unique research topic – and he found it – the impact of dynamite fishing in the Philippines.

Being a nation made up of 7,000 islands, obviously fish and fishing are important to the Filipino diet and economy. To increase their yield and work more efficiently, fishermen turned to using explosives to stun and/or kill fish, instantly bringing large amounts of fish to the surface to be scooped up.

While this practice seems advantageous in the short term, Austria explained the consequences of this practice are destroying the very ecosystem that makes the region such a rich source of seafood.

Coral reefs and seagrass beds, which are essential to a healthy marine ecosystem, are being destroyed. The food chain has been disturbed because the explosives kill both mature fish and young fish who then never get the chance to spawn, as well as plankton and other food sources for marine life.

Austria said the Catholic Church’s response to the crisis was very interesting to him – they placed religious statues in the water to deter fishermen from the practice because they wouldn’t dare blow up a statue of the Virgin Mary. The idea has shown some success, but there are only so many statues you can place in the sea.

“The local government needs to put in stricter regulations and enforce them and provide better economic alternatives for the fishermen,” said Austria.

The timeliest of the projects at the symposium, was Julia Crockett’s research on California wildfires.

Julia Crockett (right) explains what sparks wildfires and their impace. (Photo courtesy Jen Myers)

Crockett studied the environmental conditions that make that region ripe for wildfires including the Santa Ana winds and climate change caused droughts, as well as what sparks these blazes – from lightning and campfires to seemingly innocuous things like kids playing with magnifying glasses or families throwing gender-reveal parties.

She also looked at the full impact of these fires from the obvious destruction of homes and businesses, to the environmental contamination impacting water supplies, air quality, and the food chain, as well as the economic impact of lost tourism and commerce dollars.

While there are many things in this equation that we cannot control or may take decades to solve, Crockett said it starts with “studying the causes and beginning to control the things we can control while increasing awareness and education.”