Project Flowing Waters, a freshwater aquatic science research program at Texas State University – San Marcos, is funded by the National Science Foundation Graduate Teaching Fellows in K-12 Education (GK-12) and the Texas Pioneer Foundation.  This program provides generous support for ten Texas State University PhD students, each involved in critical aquatic research.  These doctoral students have two jobs: to conduct their own scientific research and to partner with teachers in the local San Marcos Consolidated Independent School District by serving as “resident scientists” in their classrooms each week.  One of the primary goals of Project Flowing Waters is to improve the communicative, collaborative, and teaching skills of the doctoral students.  Doctoral candidate Casey Williams, one of the 10 GK-12 Fellows in Project Flowing Waters, best represents excellence in scientific research and success in the secondary school classroom in this program.  Casey  examined the processes of larval fish drift and described specific drift patterns at diel, monthly, and seasonal scales in his doctoral research.  His research will help to elucidate the biological and conservation needs of three obligate riverine fishes in the lower Brazos River.  Also, these findings will be used to develop environmentally sensitive flow and water withdrawal regulations for the Brazos River and instream flow regulations of other large rivers.  In addition to his research, Casey served each week as a ”resident scientist in the classroom” in the San Marcos CISD Pathfinders, an alternative high school where student learning is computer-based.  He collaborated with science teacher Gayle Rhoades to bring the excitement of science and scientific research to students who are at risk of dropping out. Casey was very successful in establishing rapport and serving as a role model with the Pathfinders students by first tutoring them in small groups and then taking them on field trips to the nearby Blanco River, Spring Lake, and Canyon Lake.  On these trips, Casey described the morphological characteristics of fish and how morphology is used to classify fish, and discussed the importance of fish conservation.  One excited student remarked after the trip, “It’s like watching the Discovery or Nature Channel but in real life!”  According to Gayle Rhoades, “My students are having a ball!! This is by far the very best project that I have every worked on with my students.  We have planned an electrode-fishing tripo to Canyon Lake, a trip to Aquarena Springs, AND grasshopper dissection for next week.  What a wonderful opportunity-especially for our population here at Pathfinders. “  Two  Pathfinders students will be applying for American Fisheries Society Robert F. Hutton Scholarship, a program designed for attracting under-representative groups into fisheries-related sciences. Casey has been very successful in his role as a resident scientist at the Pathfinders school in increasing the interest of secondary school students in the STEM disciplines and in higher education, which is one of the goals of Project Flowing Waters.