|
|
Environment Matters: Summer 2002 |
||||
In This Issue...High Performance Schools Improve Student PerformanceIs your classroom stuffy? Is the air conditioner noisy? Does the new carpet smell? These are just a few of the problems that high performance schools help eliminate. A growing number of studies are confirming the direct causal relationship between a school's physical condition, especially improved lighting and indoor environmental quality, and increased student performance. High performance schools are learning venues that are healthy and comfortable; conserve energy, resources, and water; provide daylighting; protect the environment; and contain the amenities needed for quality education. By incorporating important concepts such as energy, water, and material efficiency into quality design, schools can also become teaching tools to illustrate a broad spectrum of scientific, mathematical, and social issues. The Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS) is dedicated to finding solutions to enhance the student learning environment. In 2000, the CHPS released a best practices manual, which has become the standard reference for high performance school design in California. This three-volume manual outlines in detail the advantages, process, and budgeting issues associated with designing high performance schools. Additionally, it provides technical design guidelines and eligibility criteria to assist school districts to create facilities that fit their budget, timeline, and educational goals. A fourth volume currently scheduled for development is an operations and maintenance guide that will also focus on the role of the educator in operating the high performance classroom. Ultimately, high performance schools significantly stimulate learning, improve student outcomes, and lower operating costs. Doesn't every teacher and student deserve to learn in a high performance school? Learn how your school can be one of the growing number of high performance schools in California. For more information on CHPS as well as other sustainable schools programs, visit the Board's High Performance Schools Web site. Waste Tire Track and Other Recreational Surfacing Grant ProgramThis program seeks to reduce the number of California’s waste tires that go to landfill disposal or are stockpiled. One million dollars has been proposed in grant funding for the upcoming fiscal year, although actual grant awards are contingent upon and subject to the availability of funds. Upon approval by the Board, a Notice of Funds Available (NOFA) will be made available on the Board’s Web site (likely in August 2002). These grants are awarded on a competitive basis and cannot exceed $100,000 for any jurisdiction. Public entities that operate and manage public recreational facilities in California can apply (i.e., cities, counties, a city and county, colleges, universities, school districts, qualifying California Indian tribes, park districts, special districts, and public recreational facilities). Only one application per jurisdiction will be accepted for this grant cycle. The final filing date for the 2002/2003 grant program is November 1, 2002. For more information, call the Tire Recycling Hotline at (916) 341-6441. Statewide Food Residuals Diversion SummitAre food scraps a concern to you or your school? Did you know that more than five million tons of food scraps in California are disposed each year? The Board will host the Statewide Food Residuals Diversion Summit on October 22–23, 2002, at the Hilton Sacramento–Arden West, located at 2200 Harvard Street in Sacramento. This two-day workshop will teach you how Californians can better manage food scrap materials by identifying barriers to food scrap collection and diversion, exploring economic incentives to build local programs, discussing solutions to develop local infrastructures, and providing case studies for businesses and jurisdictions. Stakeholders who will benefit from this Summit include schools, local government, composters and vermicomposters, solid waste haulers, food processors, food banks/rescue programs, health inspectors, restaurant industry, animal feed manufacturers, renderers, grocery industry, and hospitality industry. For schedule updates and registration information, please visit the Board’s Food Scrap Management Web site or contact Terry Brennan at (916) 341-6578. Used Oil Recycling Incentives Available!School districts can earn $0.16 for every gallon of used oil they recycle by registering as an industrial generator. Districts must submit claim reports to the Board to receive this payment. School districts that have already taken advantage of this program include:
For information about how to register as an industrial generator, please call (916) 341-6445. Turning Entertainment into Education Through ReuseLike a scene from a Hollywood movie or a child’s storybook, the Kenter Canyon Charter School’s dream of building a state-of-the-art library for its students is coming true. The happy ending is the result of the unexpected discovery of a beautiful house, which was about to be demolished, the vision of parents who believed it could be reused for the benefit of their children and classes yet to come, and financial support by many businesses and government agencies, including a $50,000 reuse assistance grant provided by the Board. The graceful Craftsman-style building that starred in the movie Life as a House was destined to end up as demolition debris in a landfill until it was rescued by parents of children attending the Kenter Canyon School and targeted for reuse as the school’s new library. Kenter Canyon School is a public elementary school in Los Angeles. The school's current library, built in 1955 for a student body much smaller than today's 420 students, is cramped and outdated and can barely accommodate one full classroom of children. Several years ago, the financially strapped Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) discontinued funding libraries throughout the district and Kenter Canyon's library was among those closed. The parents of the Kenter Canyon Parent Support Group (KCPSG), worked to reopen the library in 1993 on a part-time basis by raising money for a part-time librarian and a small stipend for books and supplies. During the summer of 2000 parents, teachers, and administrators received a grant from LAUSD to create a functional and comfortable teaching and reading library. The concept of the "New Library" was born, a library committee was formed, and the expansion plan began. In 2001, a Kenter Canyon School parent discovered that a fully engineered and architecturally distinctive house, built of Douglas fir for the New Line Cinema film Life as a House, was scheduled to be demolished at the end of filming. The post and beam building was originally constructed in a shop as a kit of parts; it was then dismantled and reassembled on the movie set. A November 7, 2001, Los Angeles Times article entitled "And the House Lived Happily Ever After" describes how the film’s costume designer, Molly Maginnis, a Kenter Canyon parent, showed fellow parent and architect Scott MacGillivray the house the day before it was slated to be demolished. MacGillivrary was amazed at the value of the building and conceived the idea of keeping the house intact and reusing it as a Kenter Canyon's new library. Once the donation was legally completed, a team of 20 professional carpenters spent four days taking the building apart, numbering all the pieces, and putting them in storage. Warner Technology, Inc., a community partner in the new library project, donated the workers’ wages. The school is currently in the process of reconstructing the building on the school’s front lawn, where it will serve as a constant reminder to students, teachers, parents, and neighbors of the benefits incorporating reuse concepts can produce. The library project is the largest instance of reuse ever conducted at the Kenter Canyon School, but the administration and the parent committee have repeatedly exercised this type of creative thinking about reuse. When the school rebuilt its playground four years ago, LAUSD saved the replaced equipment and installed it at another school in the district. Additionally, several years ago, parent volunteers built a reading garden at the school using bricks salvaged from a construction site. This library project is a creative and productive way to promote reuse of construction materials that would have otherwise ended up in the landfill. It also shows that thinking "outside the box" can result in ways to reuse materials in many venues, particularly for educational purposes. This successful connection between the film industry, which has a reputation for wasting resources, and public education, which needs resources, enables both parties to become beneficiaries. The school’s initial concept to add onto and remodel the existing library would have required demolition and significant remodeling, expenditures of natural resources and energy, at a cost about 50 percent higher than building from scratch. By reusing the large quantity of high quality lumber and hardware already purchased and used by the film studio, Kenter Canyon School became a partner with community groups and governmental agencies, whose mission is to eliminate waste and cultivate creative reuse opportunities. The story of the house that became a library is a model throughout the district and even the nation for managing resources more efficiently and for other business-community-school partnerships to reuse buildings and construction materials that otherwise might be destroyed. Additionally, the Kenter Canyon School Library will become a showplace to demonstrate how the CIWMB assists schools in reusing materials to enhance education. This library project sets an example that there are solutions to be found in reuse of land, buildings, and building materials, whether from business sources or from within the school district itself. This is especially critical at a time when the entire district has a shortage of classroom space and a lack of money for expansion. There is a potential for this story of the house that starred in a movie and became a children’s library to inspire many other similar "happy endings." At a special screening and reception of Life as a House, which the New Library Committee used to raise approximately $16,000 for the project, the film’s production designer Dennis Washington told parents of his joy that the house would survive. "Usually what we do is bulldoze," he said. "I’m thrilled this house has a chance for a second life." This "second life" will not only provide the school's current students with their first adequate library in nearly half a century, but it will serve students and the school community for many years to come.
School Waste Management Education and Assistance Web SiteThe School Waste Management Education and Assistance Web site is currently being revamped to become your "one stop shop" for all school-related assistance that is provided by the Board. The funding page has been reorganized and a "local funding sources" category has been added. The Web links page has also been reorganized with more links in new topic categories, including energy, local resources, school gardens, service learning, and sustainability. A new page will provide monthly updates on our progress implementing the mandates of the School Diversion and Environmental Education Law (DEEL), formerly referred to as Senate Bill 373. Bookmark our site and check back often to follow our progress with this important legislation. A "More Events" page will soon be added to the site. This page will feature school-related events sponsored and/or attended by Board programs other than the Office of Education and the Environment, as well as links to local government school event pages. Does your local government agency have an events page which lists events relevant to schools and educators that we can link to? If so, please send the URL to Tavia Pagan. In the Next Issue...In the fall issue of Environment Matters, look for exciting news about grants and information on an upcoming special edition of infoCycling, a Board publication. Subscribe Now!If you or one of your colleagues would like to be notified when the next issue of Environment Matters is available to view, please join our Environment Matters ListServ. |
|||||
|
Last updated: September 18, 2008 Office of Education and the Environment http://www.ciwmb.ca.gov/Schools/ Contact: EEI@calepa.ca.gov (916) 341-6769 |
