The quality of water fountains in the Wilmington Friends School community has been a flowing topic of conversation for years. Students find themselves wondering, where can we best quench our thirst? What is the best water fountain? What is the worst? This article will provide a full comprehensive review of all of the major water fountains in the school based on the following criteria: taste, temperature, stream size, and stream pressure. In recent years, major work has been done to enhance some water fountains, and the student body greatly appreciates these efforts. For instance, the school recently installed two new water fountains, one in the middle school, the other outside of the library, which have revolutionized water drinking methods. In addition to the normal drinking nozzle, there is a water bottle filler which counts how many bottles have been filled. With over ten thousand water bottles filled filled, this new addition is not only practical, but also has a positive environmental impact by reducing the amount of new bottles used. Students who have attended Friends for multiple years may remember the poor stream quality from the water fountains outside of the auditorium, but this too has changed. Drew Pittenger ’16 recognized the problem and decided to take action and get this issue solved. In 2014, Pittenger presented the problem to the agenda committee that the water fountain had been broken since he came to the school as a Kindergartner and he was now a sophomore. After about a month, the problem was resolved and the fountain was fixed.

Water enthusiast James Tallman ’19 offered these comments about the water, “I believe that the water fountains in this school have such huge differences. It is all about finding the one that suits what you like and what you need. I prefer the water fountain outside of the physics room, but many people have their own tastes.” Tallman concluded that the water fountains need to be more studied in the hopes that each water fountain that was previously deemed the best will get less traffic. One relatively unknown secret is that the faculty have their own water dispenser(different than a fountain) in the faculty lounge where staff use cups and can fill their own water bottles. Since a report was being conducted on the schools water fountains, it was imperative that testing this new source of water was added on the list. This source blew all other samples out of the water! Tallman was fortunate enough to also sample this treasured water and commented this: “I have tasted the faculty water and it tastes like cool liquid gold.” Chemistry teacher and head of science department, Mark Schmittle, concurs and adds, “I’ve tasted a lot of the water from fountains in the school and I feel that the Quench water dispenser in the downstairs faculty workroom is the best tasting water, and far better than the water that gets dispensed from the new bottle dispensers at the water fountains. The worst water is from the old water fountain located just outside Mrs. Johnson’s room.

Perhaps this special fountain is one of the perks of being a WFS faculty member. Drink on!

Data from the water fountain tests:

Outside of library:

Taste: 9

Temperature: 8

Stream size: 8

Stream pressure: 8

Art room:

Taste: 6

Temperature: 10

Stream size: 8

Stream pressure: 7

Outside of Mr. Cauchy’s room:

Taste: 9

Temperature: 10

Stream size: 9

Stream pressure: 8

Auditorium:

Taste: 8

Temperature: 7

Stream size: 7

Stream pressure: 7

Middle school:

Taste: 10

Temperature: 9

Stream size: 8

Stream pressure: 8

Cafeteria:

Taste: 8

Temperature: 10

Stream size: 10

Stream pressure: 9

Athletic:

Taste: 6

Temperature: 6

Stream size: 6

Stream pressure: 5

Faculty Lounge water:

Taste: 10

Temperature: 10