The Green Changemakers

Thursday, April 23, 2009

Sustainable Living Class: Teaching with a school garden

by Joe Gillespie

Have you ever watched kids dig potatoes for the first time? It is like a treasure hunt. Or experienced the joy of pulling a beautiful, long orange carrot, washing it, and eating it right then and there? There is no substitute for these experiences.

I have been gardening with students for a long time. More recently, I have written a couple of successful grants to purchase wind turbines and solar panels, along with community educational materials on alternative energy. For years, I did all of this with sixth graders. When I got bumped to eighth grade, I began teaching a course called Sustainable Living. I believe that I am teaching important life skills, and preparing students for a new future that may be much different than our current way of living.

Sustainable Living is a semester-long, elective class designed to teach students about sustainability through the use of our extensive garden, our rooftop solar panels, and small wind turbines. We immerse students into the world of gardening and eating the good food that we grow. With our thirty raised beds, a greenhouse, extensive worm bins, and composting area as an outdoor classroom, we learn about everything from building good soil to seed germination to preserving our crops. We monitor our own solar and wind energy production, and cook and prepare food twice a week.



Boys and their shovels.

Every day is a little different and always very hands-on. I have found something very interesting about teaching gardening over the years. There is usually no immediate gratification, which is what students are used to and what they desire. Other than seeing a radish seed pop out of the soil fairly quickly, most plants take two to three months to grow to a harvestable size. And there is all of the weeding and watering to do. Yet the reward is often so great, that if you can just get them that far, the concepts they learn are deeply ingrained in their being.

While some students may not take their learning to the level you would like them to, they do get something out of it that may reach out to them later in life. The other day some boys said they wanted to do more shoveling. They didn’t really care what the goal was, they just wanted to use a shovel! I told them the story of how I once got a very good construction job because I was able to demonstrate how well I could use a shovel.

What really works for me is my unbridled enthusiasm. The kids sense my own passion for the many topics we study, and this will always work for a teacher. I try to transfer this into keeping them as busy as possible and gradually give them more and more responsibility. If they don’t plant the seeds right, we may not have food to eat. If they don’t water the sprouts, they begin to stink. The students become dependent on each other to do their jobs well. It is experiential education at its best, and it can be very rewarding when we all work together toward a common goal.



	Dishing out today's salad, freshly harvested by that week's cooking crew.

I have also come to realize that interfacing with the public gives the kids a unique opportunity to see how much the community values what they are doing and learning. The best part of the first semester class was when we were featured at our community Green Day. The students were surprised by two things: how much the public loved what they were doing and valued their projects, and how much they actually knew and were able to share. We also sell produce when we have an abundance, usually of lettuces, and so many people like seeing these kids with their vegetables and getting different varieties of organic produce. I get asked all the time around town when our next wind turbine will go up. People want to be part of a different energy solution, and in our community, we are leading the way.

I want students to see and experience the joy of watching plants grow, to know what good soil is and how to build it, and to taste the delicious freshness of our harvests. I want them to appreciate the joy of preparing and eating food together. I want them to be able to look around on a sunny day and feel proud of the beautiful garden they have created with their hard work. I want them to be able to see clearly into the future of alternative energy and transportation. I want them to be able to live a life more connected to their surroundings and to know the stories of their food. I want them to be able to see themselves as members of their community, with an awareness of their connections to it and to the greater community of all life on Earth.

Joe Gillespie is a science teacher from Crescent Elk Middle School in Crescent City, Del Norte County, California, located on the Pacific Coast in the heart of the Redwood Forest. He lives with his wife and son on the wild and scenic Smith River, where they keep a large garden and orchard, and manage a vacation rental. Joe also chairs a local environmental organization, the Friends of Del Norte, through which he has been very active in conservation issues for over 35 years.

Reconnecting Schools to Real Food

by Tom French

Chef Tom, director of the Experience Food Project, has a broad vision of a new school food system that provides students with healthy food, reconnects them with the source of their meals, and builds bridges between the classroom and the kitchen.



	Friday Harbor Elementary School fifth grade lunch helpers get ready to serve lunch to their peers and teachers.

I feel that in schools today we do not place a lot of value on what our students eat. After all, people think you can produce an adequate nutritious school lunch for $2.75 inclusive of labor and food. More and more people understand that what we’re feeding kids in school is not as healthy as it should be, but the conversation continues to revolve around money. Which do we value more: health and vitality or money?

At the Experience Food Project, our initial foray into education was really to focus on the root cause of the rising level of obesity and diabetes among school-age children, as well as the social dilemma that has allowed us to get to this point. In our culture, we are suffering from a major disconnect with our food: where it comes from, who grows it, when it grows, how it gets here, and who prepares it. As unlikely as it might seem, this disconnect presents us with an important opportunity to develop community-based solutions to many issues by exploring innovation as a core value.

Everything the Experience Food Project does with schools is viewed through the lens of systemic change strategy. We are developing a strategy that tackles both the practical how-to issues and the more important social values issues, such as understanding where your food comes from, spending time together around the table, and nurturing as well as nourishing our students. Kids need to know that a food system is a living organism and not something super sized at will and served up in a manufactured environment. With this sort of systems change approach, we are looking around the edges to see what might be possible, including approaches that have not been considered yet.



Friday Harbor third graders "Taste, Talk, and Try" during the Experience Food Project's Chef in the Classroom Enrichment Program.

In the 2008-09 school year the San Juan Island School District became a pilot school for our Extreme School Food Makeover Challenge. We were already in discussion with them about our classroom enrichment programs; at the same time, they were debating the possibility of eliminating school meals service as a cost-cutting measure. We were coincidentally looking for a district willing to partner with us on a best practices model that would include a fully integrated and comprehensive classroom enrichment strategy, access to data, and control of the food service operation. I felt strongly that the food must reflect the values that we are promoting.

Through a series of community conversations, we explored the realities of that approach and what the potential impact of such a key decision could be, particularly how it would impact families that qualify for free and reduced meal programs. This pilot program truly was a win-win situation for everyone, especially the students.

With our school programs, we try to focus on eating as a continuation of education as opposed to an interruption of education. Working with the school and its union employees, we have remodeled the kitchen at Friday Harbor High School and developed a rich lunch menu featuring local foods, such as tacos with local grass-fed beef. Most farm-to-school programs get the “why” but not the “how,” or perhaps are naïve about the specifics of how a local school food system would work. For example, when does most food come into season? The peak of summer and early fall. And when is school not in session? The peak of summer and early fall. With the San Juan Island School District, we are trying to address this by acquiring some value-added equipment. Students will be canning and freezing local fruits and vegetables, making the school more self-sufficient while providing access to the equipment for local producers. That is the only way to achieve equitable margins for growers and schools.

The most gratifying aspect of this project for me is the appreciation students have for the quality of the food, which they in turn interpret as respect. With teachers, the impact has been felt in the classroom and in the hallways. I think some of the best feedback I heard was from an administrator who commented on the community building taking place at the lunch tables. Staff participation is high. Teachers who had not eaten school meals in ten years are now enjoying lunch with their students and colleagues.

In fact, if I could have Michael Soltman, the San Juan District Superintendent, be our spokesperson, I would. This partnership has had a profound impact on him. For most superintendents, the school meals program falls low on the radar screen. Most superintendents have to be so focused on bottom line issues these days that it is hard to find time for the things that really matter. When he saw what we had to offer in terms of what the community valued, he became our most vocal supporter.

I think the time is right and people are really looking at the values system we have been living by and saying, “something needs to be different,” including everything from money to food to education.

I often say that a lifetime of work is now the work of a lifetime; in other words, if our work contributes to a solution that has broad impact on values education, I would feel like we have done our job.

Chef Tom is a seasoned chef, consultant, and trainer with over 40 years of professional foodservice experience. Among many other accomplishments, he has served as executive chef and operations manager at FareStart, taught foodservice management at Bastyr University, and received the U.S. Mayor’s Anti-Hunger Award. He is founder and director of the Experience Food Project, an organization that aims to reconnect communities with sustainable food systems.

Sustainable Table

The multimedia resources from Sustainable Table are designed to awaken consumers to the problems with factory farming and to promote sustainable food as a desirable and more responsible alternative.

Your students will learn about industrial and sustainable agriculture and where their food comes from. So, the next time they want to eat a burger, munch on an apple, or drink a glass of milk, they’ll have more information to consider when choosing which burger, apple, or milk. Local or organic? Hormone-free? Grass-fed? Remind your students that changing one’s eating and buying habits takes time, and is a personal transition. Most important, enjoy your food!

GO TO TEACHING MATERIALS AND
EXPLORE RELATED YES! STORIES FOR EACH ACTIVITY:

:: Food Sustainability 101
:: 35 Sustainability Issues
:: The Meatrix

Food Sustainability 101

What does sustainable agriculture mean? Your students will become sustainable-literate with these useful tools.

A sustainable dictionary covers basic vocabulary from A to Z.
A well-researched chart compares sustainable and industrial agriculture on more than a dozen issues, including pesticides, animal rights, and water waste.
An FAQ (frequently asked questions), suggestions for action, and more make a bundle of information and insights.

	The Solution on our Dinner Plates What we can do about food and forests: Changes from the ground up. YES! Magazine #45, Climate Solutions
	Restoring the Range: Can Beef Be Earth Friendly? The Mortenson family is part of a growing number of ranchers who see healthy food production as part of an ecosystem, shared with plants, animals, and insects. YES! Magazine #49, Food for Everyone
	Why My Dad’s Going Green “My Republican dad saw the light. And it was green.” Kate Sheppard recounts how she found common ground with her father, a conservative farmer. YES! Magazine #47, Purple America

What’s Your Issue With Sustainability?

:: READ MORE 35 Sustainability Issues

Sustainable Table has identified 35 major issues related to sustainable and industrial meat farming.

For each issue there’s a brief, comprehensive overview, followed by links to more resources, detailed information from experts, and steps you can take to make a positive difference.

	Food to Stay How a local food system builds health and community wealth. YES! Magazine #40, Go Local!
	Food Revolution: Americans Lose their Appetite for Anonymous Food Why are farmers markets, community supported agriculture, direct farm-to-household marketing, organics, and humanely-raised meats all on the increase? YES! Magazine #37, 10 Most Hopeful Trends

The Meatrix

:: WATCH THE MOVIE The Meatrix

In 2003, Sustainable Table and Free Range Studios (producer of The Story of Stuff) teamed up to produce The Meatrix, an animated parody of The Matrix. Instead of Morpheus awakening Neo to the reality of The Matrix, Moopheus gives Leo the pig a slap of reality on factory farming.

Seven industry awards, incredible enthusiasm online, and thunderous applause from attendees at 30 film festivals inspiredThe Meatrix II: Revolting. This film looks at how dairy production has morphed from family farms into a gigantic industry.

In The Meatrix II-1/2, your students will go behind the scenes to a meat processing plant, where Moopheus, Leo, and Chickety explore working conditions, E. coli from manure, and more.

Just the Facts: Corporate Food

Hunger. Pollution. Instability. Obesity. The problem with corporate food—by the numbers.
YES! Magazine #49, Food for Everyone

Sustainable Table educates consumers and works to build community by celebrating local, sustainable food. Founded in 2003, the nonprofit organization helps consumers understand the problems with our food supply and offers viable solutions and alternatives. Sustainable Table's resources include the “Eat Well” guide and the critically-acclaimed, award-winning animated short series, The Meatrix.

Green Power

Here are the green energy ideas that can get us off fossil fuels and cool the climate.

Words to Eat By

Michael Pollan asks us to “eat food, not too much, mostly plants” and lays out a few simple rules to complement this adage. Ask your students to create their own rules for eating that preserve their health and the health of the planet.

Words to Eat By

Don't eat anything your great-great-grandmother wouldn't recognize as food.

Avoid even those food products that come bearing health claims.

Especially avoid food products containing ingredients that are

a) unfamiliar, b) unpronounceable c) more than five in number—or that contain high-fructose corn syrup.

Eat mostly plants, especially leaves.

You are what you eat eats too.

Eat more like the French. Or the Italians. Or the Japanese. Or the Indians. Or the Greeks.

Do all your eating at a table.

Don't get your fuel from the same place your car does.

Eat slowly.

From Michael Pollan, In Defense of Food, New York, Penguin, 2008.

Wednesday, April 22, 2009

Green Your School Guide

http://earthday.net/greenyourschool

To learn more about green schools by topic, click on the image above. To learn about green schools by user, click one of the boxes below.

For Teachers

For Students

Learn More

Explore our science-based and standards- aligned Lesson Plans for green schools.

Want to change your school? Don’t know how to take action? Find out how to enact significant positive green change with our Action Plans.

Learn more about each aspect of a green school with our Background Documents.

What is a Green School?

Green Schools are the most effective agents for enacting significant positive environmental and educational change in schools and communities. School greening is quickly becoming more than a trend; rather, it is now the method of choice for providing healthy, comfortable and productive learning environments while saving energy, resources and money.

A green school improves the health and energy-efficiency of the school facility, ensures science-based environmental and civic education in the classroom, implements healthy food choices into the cafeteria, promotes alternative means of transportation, and expands recreational choices and opportunities for all students.

The benefits of green schools are now well established and range from significant reductions in greenhouse gases to impressive energy cost savings, improved student test scores and higher teacher and student retention, as well as very impressive improvements in children’s health. Studies have demonstrated that green schools greatly reduce student sick days, significantly improve the health of students with diabetes, asthma and other respiratory illnesses, reduce social inequity, enhance student motivation in both the short and long term, and provide an educationally rich setting.

Despite what many people think, green schools cost on average less than 2% more to build than a traditional school, yet the payback often occurs within only a few years due to the energy savings alone. A green school typically utilizes 33% less energy and 32% less water – enough savings to hire two additional full-time teachers.

Ultimately greening America’s schools presents an extraordinary cost-effective opportunity to improve the health and educational settings for all students, increasing school equality and competiveness while reducing long-term health and operational costs.

Categories of a Green School: