Schools and Satellites

Description

Together with many teachers and their students in schools all over the North of Ghana, we will measure the rainfall that is falling during the rainy season. We measure the rainfall with self-made rain gauges, that can be made using empty Fanta bottles, some concrete, a ruler and some glue. Teachers will be trained to take measurements with their students and to use that as practical education material to teach about climate change and rainfall patterns in Northern Ghana.

Aim

Schools and Satellites (SaS) aims to better quantify and understand precipitation patterns in Ghana in West Africa. Understanding precipitation patterns is critical for water management anywhere. In West Africa, rain gauges (ground-based measurements) are few and far between. Imagery from satellites (remote sensing measurements) can be used to estimate precipitation and present a potential solution; however, current precipitation estimates from satellites for the region are very inaccurate. The goal of SaS is to use machine learning to improve these precipitation estimates from satellites; ground-based precipitation measurements from Smartphones4Water will be utilized in training and verification of the machine-learning algorithm developed. Their classic 1.5-liter bottle rain gauges will be distributed to schools and farmers in the North of Ghana, which will record local precipitation data using smartphones.

How to participate

Equipment

We will provide all information you need, and originally also the material. Currently, due to corona, we might ask you to use everything online and use materials that you already have to make the rain gauge and take measurements.