ESS IA: Practical Ideas for a Standout Internal Assessment

03 Dec ESS IA: Practical Ideas for a Standout Internal Assessment

When it comes to ESS IA (Environmental systems and societies Internal Assessment) many students fear it or/and are excited about. It can be a good reason for you to learn more about an environmental issue that is real and present in some environment. You are expected to create an environmental issue that is usually presented in a local context, collect your data and make a reasonable plan to obtain your data set points. However, it can be difficult and challenging for students to come up with great and meaningful ESS IA ideas.

If you are just beginning with your ESS IA work and investigating some good topics, or you are working on improving your ESS IA research question this article can help you in making your ESS IA shine.

What makes a great ESS IA?

Before you even start writing your IA it is essential to understand what an ESS IA really means. It represents your own practical investigation of the topic that you like most when it comes to environmental topics.

Your ESS IA should contain several parts such as:

• A focused research question
• Local and global environmental issue
• Strategy
• Repeatable methodology
• Data and analysis
• Evaluation

How to write a high scoring ESS IA?

If you started with preparation from your Environmental systems and societies IA (ESS IA) you know already that finding a right topic is harder than it seems. ESS IA makes a big portion of your final ESS mark therefore you should aim to make it a good one. Some of the most important parts when it comes to great IAs is that they have a good environmental thinking and reasoning, good amount of ESS data and well arranged methodology.

Why your ESS IA topic is important

It is simple- without a good ESS IA topic you can’t have a well written investigation. If you choose a poor topic it leads to the range of different issues- not enough data and not so well planned methodology. Therefore your analysis can not be any good.

Secondary data (Data driven) ESS IA

An ESS IA that stands out needs a good quality research question.

You should not be way too general when formulating your research question ex. How does air pollution affect population? However, try to focus your research question in a way that we can really understand what you want to investigate. Ex. How does increasing NOx levels in the atmosphere affect the incidence of asthma in children in New York?

When your research question is well formulated it naturally leads to measurable data.

Well written methodology

You need to come up with a realistic method- how are you going to measure something. The exact steps should be provided in order to be clear how you measured your data at what times and what equipment have you used. Also, why you choose your methodology must be explained. Were you using the correct tools and where? What units are you using? All of this should be linked to ESS syllabus (air pollution, water pollution, eutrophication…).

3. Data collection

A well written IA would contain:

• more than 20 data sets
• statistical tests and
• charts or graphs with clear trends/correlations

Analysis and evaluation

Your findings and results should be connected to environmental science and ecology: energy and thermodynamics, climate change or carrying capacity. You should be critical in evaluation and interpret some limitations and improvements or different explanations.

5 New ESS IA Ideas that you can use

Here are the 10 ESS Ideas that are worth writing:

1. CO2 concentrations indoors and outdoors

In this topic you can measure CO2 levels and determine the air quality levels. It requires simple data measurement and thermometer reading skills. It is good for urban environments.

2. Temperature measurements on the streets with different amount of tree cover

Here it is simple and easy to use temperature readings for your data collection. It can be used to examine a city heat island.

3. Water turbidity levels 

This is an exciting topic where you can measure using turbidity tests in order to determine turbidity levels in a local stream before and after run off.

4. Measuring the tea compost effect on plant growth

In this topic you can measure the direct effect of tea compost on any plant of your choice (it can even be vegetables). It connects well with the soil system and fertilizers.

5. pH of the rain 

In this potential topic you can measure the pH of the rainwater near the road or a park. The pH is expected to get lower (rainwater is more acidic) in polluted areas. You can use simple pH test kits or pH probe to measure acidity of the rainwater. This topic is connected to the acid rain and pollution topic in your ESS syllabus.