PYA for Radon Reduction Newsletter 2023 February | Page 9

Brian Yang, Pennsylvania

Brian lives in the Lehigh Valley, which has some of the highest recorded indoor radon readings in the United States. Brian became interested in learning more about radon after he found that his home in Center Valley, PA had significantly elevated levels of radon as well.

Brian worked with Chrysan Cronin, Professor Director and Associate Professor of Public Health, Muhlenberg College to create a sur- vey that would be used to assess the level of awareness of radon in the Lehigh Valley. The purpose of the survey is to obtain an under- standing of the public’s knowledge about radon and radon mitigation.

 

Brian plans to conduct a study of the unique geographic features in the Lehigh Valley and how it contributes to the elevated levels in this region.

Tanya Yu, Utah

When Tanya’s family moved into their new home, they found elevated levels of radon present. Prior to that discovery, they had never heard of radon before. Tanya wanted to see if this lack of awareness persisted in her community. For a class project, she surveyed 170 Salt Lake County residents to find socio- economic and demographic correlates of radon awareness.

What began as an assignment grew into a passion. She created a curriculum and spoke to 500 elementary students and 300 teachers around Salt Lake City to raise awareness. She has worked with Utah Ra- don Services and the Utah Dept. of Envi- ronmental Quality to provide free test kits to all Utahns. Tanya is currently working on building a website to raise awareness for all Utah residents. It will have a database of 18,000 Utah homes so residents can better understand their risk.

Annaliese Klemin, Utah

 

When Annaliese was coming up with an idea for her school STEM Fair, the idea of radon came up from thinking about her mom who has a rare lung dis- ease. Annaliese had no idea what radon was and how important it is. She thought that if it is so important then why hadn’t she ever heard of it? So after doing lots of research she wanted to spread awareness through her science project.

 

She later was able to test houses in her area and educate her school and many other people about radon. She was as- tounded about how many people didn’t have any care or knowledge about radon even though it was killing thousands every year. She had to do something about it so she gave people pamphlets, free test kits, presentations, and tested people’s houses for them. Annaliese’s goal for the future is to have schools teach radon in their cur- riculum so that people can be aware of the cause and test their homes. And to have radon kits be easily accessible for those just moving into new houses.