City of Clayton and MDUSD Dedicate Creekside Outdoor Science Amphitheater and Rainwater Cistern at Mt. Diablo Elementary

Educators from the Mt. Diablo Unified School District (MDUSD), municipal engineers with the City of Clayton, and parent volunteers from the Mt. Diablo Elementary PFC dedicated a creekside Outdoor Science Amphitheater and a 5,000-gallon rainwater harvesting system on Saturday afternoon at Mt. Diablo Elementary School at 5880 Mt. Zion Drive in Clayton. Situated at the northern base of Mount Diablo beside the Mitchell Creek corridor, the 1,600-square-foot outdoor learning laboratory gives 620 kindergarten-through-fifth-grade students hands-on access to watershed hydrology, native oak ecology, and meteorology.

During the autumn buildout, landscape contractors graded a natural hillside hollow into four semi-circular tiers of FSC-certified redwood seating benches facing a slate outdoor chalkboard and stainless-steel microscope demonstration table. Overhead, a corrugated galvalume shade roof channels winter roof runoff through a first-flush leaf diverter into a 5,000-gallon food-grade steel cistern, storing enough rainwater to irrigate the school's twelve raised pollinator and vegetable beds from May through October without drawing treated municipal tap water.

Alongside the amphitheater, volunteers installed a solar-powered ultrasonic anemometer, tipping-bucket rain gauge, and soil-moisture sensor suite that streams live microclimate data to classroom tablets and the Mount Diablo watershed network. Students in fourth-grade earth science classes will compare campus rainfall totals directly against upper-elevation gauges on Mount Diablo peak.

The $118,000 outdoor classroom was funded through a Contra Costa County Fish and Wildlife Propagation Fund grant, Mt. Diablo Elementary PFC fundraising, and City of Clayton stormwater education contributions. Families can view campus garden volunteer days on the Mt. Diablo Unified School District Portal.