Book

In Elkhorn Slough, an inlet on the California coast, seagrass grows healthy and strong in the shallow water, providing homes for fish, preventing erosion, and trapping carbon from the environment.

This healthy seagrass baffled marine biologist Brent Hughes. Water in the slough is chock-full of nutrients from fertilizer runoff on nearby farms. Normally, nutrient-polluted water supports huge population of algae that block sunlight from reaching the seagrass, and the seagrass dies. Why has the slough's seagrass thriving?

Today if you visit Amsterdam, you'll see bikes everywhere - they rule the road! But that wasn't always the case. Fifty years ago, Amsterdam was so crowded with vehicles that bicyclists could hardly move. But moms and kids relied on their bike to get from place to place in the city. What were they to do? Women like Maartje Rutten and her friends led protests against the unsafe streets, and one day a whole swarm of women and children took over the big new tunnel meant just for vehicles to show what a little pedal power could do.

Julia spends a lot of time looking up. But please don't call her short; she is boycotting that word. She's not allowed to boycott the local theater production of The Wizard of Oz, however. Her mother insisted that she audition, and now she has been cast as a Munchkin - even though she can't dance or carry a tune. Her summer is not starting well.

A red folder with your name on it in BIG LETTERS is not a good sign.

On the first day of sixth grade, Jimmy Murphy is already in trouble. The worst student in the class, he was hoping to make a fresh start, but his new teacher, Sister Angelica Rose, is out to get him. She picks on him, humiliates him in front of his classmates, and makes new entries in the red MURPHY folder. Worst of all, she volunteers Jimmy to preform onstage with a bunch of second graders, wearing a green banana costume.