We now have 395 schools registered, with 221,550 students served. Click here to read the program’s monthly milestones in 2010, the first full year of the program in the United States.

Happy New Year from the Eco-Schools USA team!

H – Highlight your students: Share your Eco-Schools story on our Facebook page wall, and we may feature your school as a 2011 case study.
A – Academic improvement: Research shows math, science, and reading scores improve through the Eco-Schools framwork
P – Pathways to sustainability are the key: Which of the Eight Pathways will you follow in 2011?
P – Pupils are the driving force: The Eco-Schools framework enhances critical thinking and leadership skills of participating students.
Y – You: Your Eco-Action team participation helps lead the school to tremendous success—academically, behaviorally, and environmentally.

N – New schools in your district: Pledge to help one neighboring or pyramid school register in 2011.
E – Eco-Action team: Redux – Establish fresh team goals  for the New Year.
W – Water: Implement one new H2O efficiency project in your cafeteria, bathrooms, or school garden.

Y – Yearly progress: Have you made progress on each of the Seven Steps? If so, it is time to apply for an Eco-Schools USA award!
E – Ease your way along: The Eco-Schools framework allows your school to move at its own pace. 
Set monthly goals as you work your way toward the Green Flag award in 2011.
A – Abroad: Has your school explored the Global Dimensions Pathway? The need for global solutions to the environmental issues we face has never been more urgent.
R – Reflect:  What do your students want to tackle in 2011? Check out our sample action plans for inspiration and ideas.

Climate change education in the United States is not currently well integrated into K-12 curricula. There is a gap that needs to be filled by formal education programs and tools to boost better understanding of climate science, its social dimensions and its technological implications.

By registering for free as an Eco-School, schools gain access to such resources, tools, curriculum guides and activities.  One resource, the Zerofootprint Challenge, engages students in a race to reduce energy use and learn along the way. The Zerofootprint Foundation school competition enables students to take climate action into their own hands by competing to reduce their school’s energy consumption.

Eco-Schools USA and Zerofootprint work collaboratively with school districts to provide students with easy-to-use software and social networking tools to measure their carbon footprint, provoke competition and discover a new culture of energy use.  For the remainder of the school year, students enter data for each month’s bills and watch their energy footprint change over time. To see an example of the software, visit http://usa.zerochallenge.org/.

Additionally, NWF’s Climate Classroom provides developmentally and age-appropriate curricula to educate students about the causes of and remedies for global warming.  Visit the climateclassroom.org portal to learn more and choose from Climate Classroom Kids (for younger students) and Climate Classroom Teens to access lesson plans and activities.  A high school curriculum developed by NWF and based on An Inconvenient Truth is also available for download on Climate Classroom Teens.

For more resources and curriculum guides for your school, visit eco-schoolsusa.org and register your school for free.

The deadline to enter your video is Dec. 19

Are students, teachers and faculty at your school taking bold steps to encourage innovation and implement solutions that reduce global warming?

NWF’s 2011 Chill Out competition wants to hear your story.  Submit a two-minute video that details the great work your school is doing to increase its sustainable practices, and you could win big! Enter the competition today.

The deadline to submit your Chill Out entry is December 19

Every year, the Chill Out: Climate Action on Campus competition highlights campus climate initiatives and programs and shares these success stories with a national audience.

This year, NWF seeks entries about the country’s best campus-based projects in six different categories:

Green jobs and education
Innovative research, design and technology
Students in action
Campus actions
High school actions
Green sporting events and programs

Win prizes and check out previous winners

The prizes for the competition include grant money and a feature in our national Chill Out webcast which is aired every April. You can find the full contest details and some of last year’s videos at www.campuschillout.org.

Follow the Campus Ecology team on Twitter @CampusEcology.

www.eco-schoolsusa.org

November 15 has been designated America Recycles Day by Keep America Beautiful, a national volunteer-based community action and education organization.  On Monday, America Recycles Day will help inform people when, where and how to recycle in their community.

Reducing Waste at School

Students at one California Eco-School are reducing the amount of trash that the school community produces:

“The idea was to recycle our school’s cardboard lunch trays by placing them on a recycling table after depositing the trash into nearby garbage cans. The concept was to simply set up a collection point in the form of a school table in the most populated places of the lunch areas and surrounded them with trash cans for easier accessibility. The table is surrounded by trash cans to deposit the food. The paper lunch trays are piled on the tables.

“At the end of one school day, we were able to save around 640 lunch trays, the equivalent of  filling four large garbage bins. There are 180 school days in our school year, of which around seven don’t offer a lunch period. If a school were to implement this simple idea on the first day, this practice could save around 110,720  recyclable trays each school year. If the six million students in California’s 9,900 schools used this practice, it could save more than 6,336,000 lunch trays per day – around 1,096,128,000 per year.”

- Alicia, 8th grade student at Suzanne Middle School

Read more about what Alicia’s Eco-School is doing to go green here.

Recycling Tips from Eco-Schools USA

The average American creates a staggering 4.5 pounds of garbage per day. Almost everything we do creates waste, and as a society we produce more waste than ever before.

Most trash created by our schools is made up of food, paper and packaging waste. A school can reduce its environmental impact by analyzing the full life cycle of the products it uses. Lowering consumption in the first place is a critical step to begin making a difference.

One way to minimize waste in your school’s community is to create a culture of re-use.  Teachers can prolong the lives of envelopes by sticking new labels over previous addresses, or designate a supply closet to swap supplies instead of purchasing new ones.  If your school has an electronic newsletter, include “want lists” to ask parents and other community members to donate useful items they no longer need.

Reducing packaging and transport distance and recycling as many items as possible all translate into smaller amounts of garbage being hauled away.

Want additional tips for your school? Learn more on Eco-Schools USA’s Consumption and Waste Pathway page.

NWF and Jobs for the Future (JFF) have teamed up to help spur green jobs education, innovation and training at community colleges in select regions across the country.

On October 28, South Texas College will host the first in a series of regional summits, designed to identify economic development opportunities and build relationships between employers, campuses, and lower-skilled adults.

Summit participants will explore clean energy economy opportunities in San Antonio, Houston, southern Texas and surrounding areas.  Click here to learn more about the summit, and follow this two-year initiative on Twitter @Greenforce.

Campus Solutions to Global Warming

Calling all creative and innovative campuses: Chill Out by submitting your two minute video today!

What is your high school or college campus doing to reduce its environmental impact? NWF is hosting its fifth annual national competition Chill Out: Climate Action on Campus and wants to hear from you.

Every year, Chill Out turns the spotlight onto campus climate initiatives and programs and shares these success stories with a national audience. This year, we are looking for the country’s best campus-based projects in six different categories:

• Green jobs and education
• Innovative research, design and technology
• Students in action
• Campus actions
• High school actions
• Green sporting events and programs

The prizes for the competition include grant money and a feature in our nationwide Chill Out webcast, to be aired in April. To enter, you need to create a two minute video describing your high school or college campus’ efforts.  The deadline for entries is December 19, 2010, and students, faculty and staff are eligible to compete.

You can find the full contest details and some of last year’s videos at www.campuschillout.org.

Follow the Chill Out team on Twitter @CampusEcology.

Earth Science Week 2010 begins this Sunday.

“Exploring Energy“, the theme of this year’s series of events, provides an opportunity to boost energy literacy in the United States.

Want to get involved? From October 10-16, explore clean energy and climate solutions by registering your school for NWF’s Eco-Schools USA program.  This international program provides a framework for students and teachers to learn more about Earth’s energy resources, both renewable and nonrenewable.  By moving at their own pace through the program’s Seven Steps, students learn how to monitor and reduce their school’s energy use.

Go beyond exploring energy during Earth Science Week 2010, and learn how to implement solutions that help move us away from a carbon-based society and toward a clean energy economy. 

Click here to read more by NWF education curriculum specialist Jennifer Hammonds.

With jobs in the country’s emerging clean energy sector growing two and half times as fast as jobs overall, NWF has partnered with national non-profit Jobs for the Future on a two-year project that will spur green jobs education, innovation and training at community colleges in the United States.

The Greenforce Initiative™, announced today, will provide high-quality assistance to community colleges to strengthen their capacity to develop, expand, or refine green pathway programs designed for lower-skilled adults or non-traditional students who cannot currently access such programs.

A 2009 study found that the number of jobs in America’s emerging clean energy economy grew at a national rate of 9.1 percent between 1998 and 2007, while traditional jobs increased by only 3.7 percent during the same time period.

Furthermore, research shows that clean energy investments at the level of about $150 billion per year can generate around 1.7 million net new jobs throughout the economy.

The initiative has created six regional Learning and Action Networks and has partnered with community colleges in North Carolina, Northern Virginia, Chicago, South Texas, Seattle and Michigan.

Support for the commitment comes from a two-year, $1 million grant from the Bank of America Charitable Foundation, while a two-year, $250,000 grant from the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation supports the initiative’s implementation in Michigan. Addition funds provided by The Kendeda Fund.

Click here to view the embedded video.

It used to be that the end of summer meant the end of endless hours of outdoor play time, but now kids are playing indoors year round. Parents and schools need to step up and help kids achieve a better balance.

NWF’s Kevin Coyle released a new report today which documents existing research about how added outdoor time and outdoor education consistently boost a child’s academic performance. The report shares tips for parents and caregivers who want more outdoor time for their kids. You can download Back to School: Back Outside! by visiting beoutthere.org.

Many schools already implement outdoor education during the school day. What are schools doing in your state? Check out our new interactive map to see all registered Eco-Schools in the country…the list is always growing! Visit ecoschoolsusa.org to learn more about this international program.