Oregon Student Finds School’s Toilet Water Cleaner Than Drinking Fountains
EEEEEEEEUUUUUU! This potential science fair project is, or should be, an embarrassment to the school administration when the water quality in the school toilets was better than the hall water fountains. ‘
Katherman, 13, used Q-tips and petri dishes, swabbing the spigots of four fountains and sampling one toilet, dunking the cotton in the bowl’s center and then dragging it around the rim for a complete sample. He took the results to the school lab put them under a light to speed up the bacteria’s growth. The petri dishes with fountain water were swarming with bacteria. The sample from the toilet was clean, probably because the toilets are doused with cleansing chemicals daily.
What is equally disturbing is the thought that occurs to the Chief that this problem may be potentially present at other locations than this particular school.
I wonder if she flushed the toilet before she took the same, if so that part of the experiment is not valid.
My experience from teaching science for 25 years would lead me to think that it was OK. The flushing would give a sample of the state of the fixture at the time the swab was taken. In the case of the water fountains, the same thing would be the case. Since the water fountain (by definition) was “flushed” with fresh water each time it was used, the flushing of the stool would not be introducing an uncontrolled variable, since the same thing would happen in both cases.