BYESVILLE — At the first meeting of 2018, Byesville Rotarians learned they served a record number of families with food baskets during the 2017 Christmas season. Club members were pleased with the service project.

The club limit for food baskets in 2017 was 200 — 20 baskets more than were prepared for in 2016. The club had more than 200 requests and began a waiting list. Those on the waiting list were called if any of the food baskets were not claimed on the day the club distributed baskets.

Project chair, Dennis Harding, expressed appreciation for all of the community support in cash donations as well as volunteers who assisted. He also expressed appreciation for the canned food drive effort undertaken by the students and staff of Rolling Hills schools.

Speaker for the first meeting of the year was Rusty Roberts. A retired educator, Roberts has combined his interest in health and education by serving as research assistant for the University of Cincinnati, Department of Environmental Health. He described the air and water studies he has been coordinating in Guernsey.

Students and teachers from seven area school districts took part in the research project. They included Caldwell Exempted Village Schools; Cambridge City Schools; East Guernsey, Noble and Rolling Hills local schools; St. Benedict School and Mid-East Career and Technology Centers. A total of 2,230 students and 30 teachers took part in testing air and water in their communities.

The University of Cincinnati provided the testing kits and teacher resource guides. The kits and resource guides were developed to meet state standards for subject matter in areas such as chemistry vocational agriculture and natural resources. Using the kits, students identified water temperature, acidity level, dissolved solids level, source of water and the geographic coordinates of each sample.

Roberts reported that to date all samples are clear. More work needs to be done. Roberts explained that, currently, the project needs more monetary support and project coordinators are hoping to obtain grants to fund the testing of 135 additional sites.