Some middle schoolers with Horizons Enrichment Program went to Ontario Beach to
learn the science behind the no swimming signs.

You can swim at Ontario Beach any day, if you're a goose. Some days the water just isn't clean enough for humans. There's too much bacteria in the algae.

As the county carries on the daily effort to keep the algae from collecting along the shoreline, middle school students from around the area are working to understand why
sometimes it's not safe to swim in this water.

Another top question for the 32 students in this years' Get Real Science Camp is "What
is this?"

"Maybe we should take a picture. Let's see if we can figure out what it is when we get to the lab this week."

That lab is at the University of Rochester. Future science teachers from the U of R Warner School of Education and others are the student's guides through this hands on
learning experience.

"This is the stuff these kids are out there analyzing. It's the algae that grows in the grass and what not. It's filled with bacteria and that means sometimes the beach is closed.
Today it's open so they're going out as far as they can in the water to try and learn more, collect samples and analyze what's out there."

"We saw green algae out there," said Trianni McKinney. “We saw clams clumped
together. We saw chicken bones and corn on the cob and stuff.”

"When we were just out in the water they wanted to pick up the algae. We said pick it up feel it, what's it feel like"

Lisa Zeller is a student at the Warner School. She says the goal is to show the kids the science in every day problems and methods of understanding those problems.

"We were talking about this yesterday. How many of you come down to the beach and find out it's closed and you were sad because you couldn't go swimming. They all raised their hand."

The students went right to work downloading their data and growing their bacteria samples. When they're done analyzing, they'll do a presentation for the county health department.

"They're going to set up portfolios.” Says Zeller. “ They'll have trifolds with presentations and we'll definitely take their information and use it he has in the past."

And perhaps come up with some solutions so more humans can have more beach days.