Checkpoint: Green Schools
- Students perform higher on tests.
- Air quality is improved. This is good news for allergy prone children and adults alike. Some children have been reported to 'toss' their inhalers after spending time in the new green environment.
- Reduced absenteeism.
- Increased productivity.
- Savings in operating costs.
- Great environmental benefits.
- Attraction of interested teacher and student pool.
"Green schools on average save $100.000 per year! Enough to hire 2 additional teachers or purchase 5000 textbooks or lower tuition at private schools!"
Find Green School Links Here:
ENERGY STAR for K-12 School Districts
Partnering with ENERGY STAR, this government site is dedicated to the students and the environment with helpful tips and guidelines.
Your school can download brochures that will outline Energy Management Practices as well as the Portfolio Manager, a free tool that tracks and evaluates your school’s energy performance.
Find out which schools are the greenest and how your school can become a part of a High Performance School Energy Strategy for the future.
Building Green Schools
The U.S. Green Building Council has a wonderful web site called ‘Building Green Schools’. It is the best start for your endeavor to educate the new generation of ‘green’ students at your school.
U.S. Department of Energy - Energy Smart Schools
Their Building Technologies Program consists of helpful links to getting your school ready to operate as an EnergySmart School. They offer tools for planning, financing, designing, building and operating your school with great guidelines in all the above mentioned areas.
Go Green Initiative
is a simple, comprehensive program designed to create a culture of environmental responsibility on school campuses across the nation. They created a planning guide that has a step-by-step overview and suggestions about how to tackle the ‘green giant’. The site includes tips for teachers, parents and students alike. They even include a sample letter to the School Board and parents to announce the program after you have decided to go green. Cool!
Harvard Green Campus Initiative
is the ‘mother’ of all green schools. They were really serious about sustainability when others where still trying to figure out if their school should be even talking about becoming green. The site is full of hands on advice about their environmental programs and services. Granted they are the best endowed school out there but their Green Loan Fund has recently doubled and they have over 20 staffed people just to run the environmental side of the whole campus.