Chances are that if you go to Watkins Mill, you’ve drank from one of the many interesting fountains. You’ve probably taken five or more steps back to whatever classroom you came from before having the same thought everyone else has had; “that didn’t taste good, doesn’t that water have lead in it?” You also probably overreacted and thought, “Crap I’m gonna die.”

Or maybe you were too thirsty, so you just started chugging away, hoping that none of the Chornobyl-level chemicals would affect the way your future kids will look 20 years from now. Who knows?

Maybe your parents used to go here, and maybe they told you about the weird water, how they only drank it when desperate, and now you start to piece together why it hurts so much when you think during a math test.

All jokes aside, lead exposure is very serious and can cause brain damage, developmental and behavioral problems, and issues with speech. This can come from a series of things including lead-based paint, contaminated dust, or in this case, lead pipes that bring drinking water to water taps.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention themselves have said that the amount of lead levels safe for a child to have is zero.

In February of 2022, almost 80% of public schools in Maryland were found to have one or more lead-infested taps. The Biden-Harris Administration has issued many, many, many statements regarding these remaining service lines with lead pipes still abundant in the country, including Maryland. In their latest statement, the Administration’s Bipartisan Infrastructure Law (signed by Biden in 2021) “Provides $15 billion in funding specifically dedicated for replacing lead service lines.”

However, according to an article published by ABC News on November 18, 2023, this issue has spread at an almost national level. The article interviews one student at a high school in Rockland County, New York, who stated that “we don’t have access to running water” when speaking about the school’s water fountains. Records have also shown a good amount of lead found in several Pennsylvania schools.

So entering 2024, you can’t be too careful.

Using state-of-the-art lead testing water strips, I (with some help from Michael Aragon) spent two weeks testing each fountain in the school for even one particle of lead. Remember that 0 ppb to 5 ppb (parts per billion) is considered the safest amount.

The results that came in genuinely shocked me. After all this time, all this talk, everything led up to what is the greatest and worst ending an investigative article could ever find itself stuck with.

Now, looking back on it, I ask myself this: why did I think there was going to be lead in the water? Why does everyone else think there is lead in our water?

One good reason, I believe, is because of how every person in the county perceives this school. Watkins Mill has a reputation (if you know, you know) and this can create many stereotypes about the school. 

So you add lead in water to a list of problems with this school and that leads to an urban myth. Honestly, it’s nice that something like this isn’t true. Because for once, some wild story about this place was just really only that, a story. It honestly could have led to situations way worse than imaginable if true. Also (obviously), previous tests done before, but once again, you can never be too careful. 

I still don’t know why the water tastes the way it does. Just be glad the waters are safe.