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The weather station on top of Fenway Hall has been collecting and recording weather data since last July. Though most students and faculty are unaware of its existence, the station could play a prominent role in natural science coursework and in assisting Bentley administration in several areas of decision-making.
The station has five sensors which collect data on temperature, humidity, wind speed/direction, rainfall, and barometric pressure. This information is then sent to a data logger on the third floor of Fenway which records the information. A PC on the 2nd floor then houses the data as well as configures the sensors on the station. Soon, both the live and historical weather data from this PC will be accessed remotely by computers in the Natural and Applied Sciences (NAS) Department and elsewhere across Bentley
The applications from this station are numerous. The first and most obvious is that NAS classes such as “The Atmosphere” and “Global Climate Change” could incorporate the data into the course curriculum in order to give students a more hands-on experience. But the data also have potential to be used in a whole slew of mathematics and CIS courses at Bentley. For instance, it may be tempting for a GB210 professor to use the data set from the weather station rather than a fictitious text book data set package.
Additionally, there has been some talk of Bentley incorporating wind turbine technology into its environmental sustainability program. Data from the station can provide good information about wind patterns at the school. The station could also assist in determining whether or not to cancel classes in weather emergencies. Further down the road, the station could even be showcased as a featured weather reporting location with one or more of the local Boston news channels.
Bentley’s NAS Department has owned the weather station for six years, but they have consistently run into problems installing it. Initially, the device was slated to go atop a roof on upper campus, but the roofs turned out to be too sloping and inaccessible. Next, the Dana Center’s roof was under consideration, but the facility’s extensive renovations dashed those plans. Eventually, Facilities Management at Bentley suggested that the flat roof of Fenway dorm would be the appropriate environment for the station, and assisted the NAS Department in implementing the project. In order to complete the task, NAS employed the help of the Academic Technology Center and Web Services among others.
The project was not without some challenges. Since so much time had elapsed, issues arose about the software. Joseph Nezuh from the Academic Technology Center assisted NAS in installing the station’s software and hardware. Nezuh sought the help of Sensible Technologies, a Texas-based software firm, in order to write the software used to log and view the weather data. In order for the data to be more applicable to NAS classes and the Bentley general body, the data needed to accessible via the web. Nicholas Maloney from Web Services was sought in order to replicate the data on a web page, a project he is currently working on, which is also a directed study for his last undergraduate class at Bentley.
Most weather stations are placed at ground level in order to get the most accurate readings, though NAS did not believe that was feasible on campus. As a result, the station will have to be serviced occasionally in order to make sure that it is working at an optimal level. “Someday, we will need to do a calibration test on the station, because it is on the roof and the wind readings are different there than if we were taking them at ground level,” says Professor P. Thompson Davis, an NAS faculty member who has been prominent in implementing the weather station project.
Only time will tell how much this weather information is used. One thing is for sure, Bentley has a unique and important asset that many students and faculty are unaware of. For those wishing to catch a glimpse of the weather station, the best view is from the Beaver Street bridge that connects lower campus to upper campus.
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