Blogs & Ecology

If you’re a high school student with an idea to make your community a more sustainable place to live then there’s a new contest that just may be a great way to get the seed money you need to get your project off the ground. Put together by The Weather Channel and the National Environmental Education Foundation as a part of Classroom Earth, they’re looking for smart, innovative, and workable solutions to pressing environmental issues.

And get this; they’ll even pay you a cash stipend for being a local environmental intern to go along with the seed money you'll receive to help make it happen!
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It may have slipped by your news reader during the dog days of summer, but don’t think for a second that the AFT’s recent adoption of a green schools and colleges resolution is anything less than a landmark event; because with 1,400,000 members the AFT has the membership muscle to back up their call for greener schools in America....

If you’re as interested in seeing our schools cutting energy costs and their total carbon footprint as Sen. Clinton and the United States Green Building Council are then there’s no doubt you’ll want to get involved with their upcoming series of webinars aimed to help schools across the country get a better idea of just how valuable some simple investments in green infrastructure can...

If you’ve been looking for a great reusable bag that folds in tightly on itself for easy carrying in no time at all then look no further than the keychain that turns itself into a reusable tote put out by GrowKids.

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Photo credit: Global Green

Global Green, Hollywood's favorite environmental non-profit, is showing they have the substance to back the style: last week, they launched their pilot program to create five green schools serving low income children in the Los Angeles area. Along with Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC), Global Green unveiled two of the finished projects with a ribbon cutting ceremony. Of course, the ribbon was green. Pics of the school after the jump....

If you’re a high school student with a passion for the environment and a way with words then we’ve got a contest that’s right up your alley. But you’d better hurry because the deadline for the Weather Channel's high school essay contest is just days away. ...

The days of the week have taken on entirely new meanings at our Go Green Initiative School of the Week, Westmount Elementary School in Strathmore, Alberta, Canada.

Plain old Tuesdays became Trash-Free Tuesdays and mundane Wednesdays are dubbed Walk or Wheel Wednesdays. Students are encouraged to rinse and recycle milk cartons with the creative Squish and Swish campaign.
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While the grammatically inclined may be wondering where the apostrophe went in the name of the Go Green Initiative's school of the week way back when it was founded, but the simple truth is that they’re doing amazing things to help educate kids about the environment while making an impact on our world today at the same time. And with fall upon us, they've got a program running that's right on target for the season....

When you hear that our Go Green Initiative School of the Week is located in Groton, NY and has a terrific lunch scrap recycling program called Rot-N-Groton, you know they’ve got both a sense of humor and a knack for getting students involved in cool ways recycling and putting together a greener campus.

Of course, their Goin’ Green T-shirt initiative also has students raving about the worth of a dollar and the benefits of recycling.
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If you’ve got a young child or a Pre-K classroom near you that could benefit from a cute book that helps even the smallest child consider simple ways that they can help to take better care of our world then there’s a good chance this book is just what you’re looking for. Reminding them in gentle ways of the little things they can do to help the earth like turning off the water when they’re busy brushing their teeth, remembering to use both sides of the paper when drawing a picture, or planting seeds and watching them grow....

If you’ve been waiting for something great to make you stand up and find a way to change the world there’s no doubt that the Siemens We Can Change the World Challenge is built for you. Launched in collaboration between the National Science Teachers Association (NSTA), the Siemens Foundation and Discovery Communications as a means to educate, empower and inspire students and their teachers to become agents of change in making the environment a top issue in their neck of the woods.

And the prizes for the top entries that students submit are sure to grab their attention!...

With the school year just beginning and Christmas not too far away there’s a great line of plush toys designed to help teach kids about the world around them that just may work well in the early elementary or PreK classroom or even as a stocking stuffer.

The toys, called Idbids, are a trio of colorful characters that each encourage kids to make “iddy biddy” steps to go green through various activities that work to simplify complex issues and make them easy for kids to understand.

Each character has green feet, it’s very own personality and is dedicated to a particular environmental element.
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If you’re looking for the place where committed teachers, parents, administrators government officials and a whole host of other school related and not-so-school related personnel get together to compare best practices and stimulate their nerve endings when it comes to environmental issues and our schools there’s no better event than the Go Green Earth Summit, and the conference this year is next month in Syracuse, NY.

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Despite the fact that there’s often so many things stacked against kids growing up in the inner-city, there’s one young eco-hero that’s defying the odds and making an incredible difference while helping to shed a bit of light on how successful students can be at affecting change in their own neighborhoods.

Because when Juan Hernandez recently moved to West Oakland from Bakersfield, California and found his asthma flaring up to the point where he could no longer engage in his favorite sport, running, he decided to step up and do something about it.
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While there may be no doubt that school fundraising of all angles is a standard of the educational system in America and beyond, there’s one product that you just may never heard of being used to help raise funds for schools; carbon offsets.

With a new program called Brighter Schools put out by the folks at Brighter Planet, schools receive 20% of the cash raised from any purchase of carbon offsets through the program by students, teachers, friends and allies of their school. There’s even a way for schools to track their overall impact as a team reducing their carbon footprint through the website.