Fresno State Students Clean The San Joaquin, Sept. 25

We pulled out trash and tires and its just like back breaking work it was super you know, its really worth it. Well pretty much the boys they wanted to get a tire, like a really big tire into the boat but I was in the middle so they told me to get out and I helped put the tire on to the boat and then I just jumped in because there was no other place for me to go. I was helping Matt get out one of the large tires up here down the river on the bank and a ways up in the current we saw his dad was in a single ride kayak and he was starting to turn sideways with the current. Eventually the current just picked up underneath him and he flipped over right into the water. He lost it and his paddle we had to retrieve it. But, he was ok, actually he right back up and started going down the current again. So I think heâ he's dedicated, definitely. One of our tires was a large tractor tire that took six guys to get out alone and we tied it on a rope and kind of played tug-a-war with it to get it out of the water. We found a tire big enough to sit inside and roll down the hill. We have over 100 people right now working in four different sites along the river all west of Highway 99. So there’s a biology class, a Smittcamp Family Honors College class and both those classes are involved in all this to help organize it. They’re the ones, that's why there are 100 people out here because they organized it. It's costal commission day. All other the state of California there are groups cleaning the rivers, cleaning the ocean. It’s also the Great Sierra River Clean-up which is our portion of the costal commission. We’ll collect 13 14 tons of debris. Most classes and rightly so are organized around textbooks, assignments and papers to write. But its good every once and a while to have a class that takes you out of the classroom that works with community groups, does research that immediately practical to groups or to the river. The students work with California Fish and Game, and they work with the Bureau of Reclamation, they work with Metropolitan Flood Control, they work with these groups doing research for them. And in over three years we’ve cleared over 100 tons of debris from the river and that's important. And it gets them outside and it gives them a collegial experience with their classmates that they wouldn't otherwise have. It's an important part of being in college.