Impoverished and Minority Populations Face Increased Lead Content in School Drinking Water
AJAS · 2022 Environmental Science
Overview
Increased drinking water contaminant concentrations have been frequently reported in communities with higher minority percentages as well as those with lower average incomes, causing numerous adverse effects. This study expands on current knowledge, examining lead concentrations in public school drinking water as it compares to each school's percentage of minority and poverty students, using a linear regression for each factor. Twenty-one schools participated in the study and provided three water fountain samples each, totaling 63 samples. The former regression regarding minority percentages yielded a p-value of 0.003 as well as a r-value of 0.602. The latter regression yielded a p-value of 0.010 and a r-value of 0.540. Both regressions showed significant correlations between socioeconomic factors and lead concentrations (p-value < 0.05 and r-value between 0.5 and 0.7). A linear regression was also conducted between minority and poverty percentages and yielded a p-value of 0.000 and a r-value of 0.964. While these socioeconomic factors are highly significantly correlated, the factors are not identical and yielded different p-values and r-values when compared to lead content. The regression argues that while minority and poverty percentages in student populations significantly correlate with lead concentrations in drinking water, minority percentages are more significantly correlated, and therefore a better predictor of lead, than poverty percentages. This suggests that there is a systemic problem in water access, where lower-income and predominately minority populations endure lasting health effects that higher-income and minimally minority populations endure less.
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My Story
In tenth grade, I researched how urbanization was impacting the water crisis in Sub-Saharan Africa which opened my eyes to the overlooked privilege that readily available potable water is. With the Flint Water Crisis in Detroit, Michigan and a similar event in Denmark, South Carolina, I saw as an issue that I thought was limited to foreign countries was happening in a place I called home. With this study, I aimed to shed light on an overlooked situation in which children and adolescents are being unjustly subjected to worsened water quality due solely to the socioeconomic status they cannot control. After finishing my project, I was able to publish my paper in the Journal of the South Carolina Academy of Science after competing with SCJAS.
Additional Items
Link to my full published researched paper: https://scholarcommons.sc.edu/jscas/vol19/iss2/7/
Images (15)
Awards (1)
- AJAS Fellows Badge
Competition history
- AJAS 2022
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