School Name: Scituate High School Project Title: Scituate High School NEED Project Advisor s name: Shannon Donovan Summary: Scituate High School s NEED club has had a very productive year, and plans on continuing that success in the future. At the start of the year the main focus was to become masters of the Science of Energy stations. In December our skills were put to the test when we hosted a two youth energy conferences. During the conferences we taught elementary and middle school students the skills they needed to do their own NEED projects. At the RI Hope 5k we set up a station near the finish line in which we held a fun interactive energy activity station for the kids. Another proud accomplishment we achieved was to host a Scituate High School plant sale. We did this to promote the purchase of local food to reduce the amount of emissions produced from vehicle transportation of food. We also assisted at the water festival, here we taught kids about watersheds and how we benefit from them. After recognizing our winner from last year s Taterthon contest we started preparing for this year s contest. The purpose of this contest is to encourage kids by doing a friendly competition to get kids involved with growing their own food to reduce transportation fuel use. To stay up to date on our contest visit taterthon.org for more information. This year we also revived our What can one person do? campaign. By using social media we are reaching out to people asking them what can they do to help conserve energy. Following up on last year s very successful tree planting with Calcutt Middle School s NEED club, we decided to continue to build on this partnership after seeing the effect it had on everyone who was involved. So, once again we wrote a grant to get money to plant trees around their school. Planting these trees has a large effect in heating and cooling costs for buildings near them. They will make Central Falls a much more beautiful place, and also reduce the heat island effect. Using the interactive software GIS we were able to document and mark where the trees were planted around the school. Check out our website www.centralfallsarboretum.org to stay up to date on our future projects partnering with CF.
NEED Workshop for Middle and Elementary Students Goals: To teach younger students about lots of different energy topics and what NEED is about, so that they can be teachers and leaders too; to help other student groups get involved with NEED Activities and Tasks: We each picked a topic to get trained on; at the workshop we set up 16 stations of different energy topics. We made mini kits for each station for two schools. We did two whole-day workshops, one for Nathan Bishop Middle School and one for Tiogue Elementary School. Besides the stations, we played energy Bingo, Fish, and Polar Bear. At lunch we also made solar bracelets. We asked the guests to write in their science notebooks at each station, and they did a great job with that. Energy Content and Resources: The activities that we did almost all came from little parts of different NEED kits: Science of Energy kits, PV, Building Energy, and Wind. They involved learning about transformation of elastic potential energy to motion energy, the different forms and sources of energy, chemical potential energy to thermal energy, radiant energy to electrical energy, radiant energy to thermal energy, chemical potential energy to electrical energy, motion to electrical energy, electrical energy to motion, and chemical potential energy to radiant energy. We taught about transportation fuels and food connections, and types of lighting. We also did some actual experiemnts and collected data for wind, PV, and insulation types. Student Leadership: Every student leader in our club had to learn a station and another role for the day station Our more experienced club members were paired with newer members. They learned all the material needed during club time and before school so that they were able to teach the younger students. NEED students did all the presentations in the workshop. Evaluation: The elementary school students completes pre- and post- workshop polls. We also had lots of positive feedback from their teachers. The students sent us cards to thank us and tell us about what they learned. Most importantly, again this year our goal was to get more school into NEED, we know we were successful because both schools did cool energy related activities after their training with us!!!
ATB Grant & Tree Planting Goals: To get more students involved in saving energy by planting trees Activities and tasks: Again this year we partnered with Calcutt Middle School and Central Falls High School to plant trees in Central Falls. We worked together to write a grant to America the Beautiful to get money for the bus and the trees. We got lots of volunteers and planted 14 trees with the City. We also worked together to make a video about how to plant a tree. After the planting, we worked in teams to write about what trees mean to us all. Energy Content and Resources: Trees save energy by reducing heating and cooling costs. They make oxygen and filter water. They make our homes more beautiful, so people are in a better mood. These are some of the things that we wrote about in our teams. They said that this will go on the web site somewhere. Student Leadership: Each member of the planting team was assigned to a different group. There were 7 groups. After planting and mulching, we had to collect data about our new trees and about the ones that got planted last year. By doing this we helped the city with their urban forest inventory. With this information we will be able track energy savings over time due to the trees using itree, an app that helps to show some of the benefits of trees. Evaluation: We know we were successful because they gave us the grant and we did what we said we we would do on the planting day. They mayor and city council and Channel 10 came to our planting day and thanked us. Because of the project that we began last year, others in the city are starting to step up to plant more trees and make the city nicer. One ot the sponsors that we got involved is planting 65 more trees on Illinois Ave in April!!! Our actions have brought about a great change!!!!!
Taterthon 2015! Goals: - to grow more food locally to reduce the use of transportation fuels - to show children how they can make a difference Activities and Tasks: This is the 2 nd year that the Scituate High School NEED club is sponsoring our event called Taterthon. We will be reaching out to elementary-age school children and giving them the opportunity to grow their own potatoes. They will record their results in a scientific notebook that we provide and later on, collect for examination. Awards will be given in several categories for the most impressive notebooks. Our Scituate High School NEED team has created a video to further explain this contest. The video can be accessed at Taterthon.org Energy Content and Resources: The purpose of Taterthon is to stress the importance of growing more food locally. If we eat more locally grown food, less transportation fuel will have to be used to bring this food to us. Some of the foods we eat are grown thousands of miles away, so it is also very expensive to drive this food across the country. Greenhouses gases also release emissions into the air, which are very harmful to the environment. Growing our own food saves water, fuel, and money. If we spread this information to the youth of today, we will teach them how to be more eco-friendly, efficient, and self-sufficient. Student Leadership: All of the members of NEED, as well as many middle school students took part in our video to spread awareness about Taterthon. Evaluation: There was an article about Taterthon in the Kent County Times. This is our 2 nd year of Taterthon and we have just completed our second video. Last year, Taterthon was very successful, and we hope to reach out to even more potential participants this year. A lady at the department of education sent out our message about Taterthon 2016, and in the first 24 hours we had over 400 requests for kits to participate! We asked the kids to weigh the potatoes that they grew last year so that we could report that here, but not everyone followed our directions, so we are changing the notebooks to help with that this year. As the prize for our winning school, Tiogue Elementary, we built and installed raised bed gardens for them to grow food and save more energy! We just got Banagrams as a sponsor for 2016!
Worm Composting! Goals: To save energy by using natural fertilzer instead of chemical fertilizers that use fossil fuels. Activities and tasks: Whe we first started What Can One Person Do, a lady frome Australia posted a video and said I can start a worm farm! This was our favorite video from that project and it inspired us to start this one! We invited Nancy, the Worm Lady of Charlestown, to come talk to our club. We used club funds to buy a worm farm. We plan to use this to start more work farms for other school. This will take some time to develop. Energy Content and Resources: Conventional fertilizers use lots of fossil fuels and contribute to climate change. By using worm castings to fertilize in our gardens we will save energy and reduce our contribution to climate change. Having the worms compost food waste will also reduce methane production, further lowering our contributions to climate change. Reducing waste sent to the landfill will extend the life of our landfill and reduce transportation fuel use. Student Leadership: Jaime did his senior project on worm farming. We are responsible for watering and feeding the worms. Evaluation: We have two new worm farms. Next year we hope to divide them up and make more. We are just at the beginning of this project.
Saving Energy: Reducing Transportation Fuel Use by Our Own Growing Food Goals: To reduce energy waste and emissions related to food transportation by growing more of our own food and helping others do the same Activities and tasks: We grow food in our school garden and donated it to a local food pantry (Trinity Church). We help the 3 elementary schools in our town and 2 in Coventry to grow food in their gardens. We have a plant sale and sell organic seedlings to people in the community. We donate extra seedlings to lots of places, incuding a garden at a local group home and a community garden in Providence. We expanded our reach with Taterthon. This year we also did a service project with NRICD to help make mushroom logs. We drilled the holes, added the dowels with the fungus growing on them, and seal them with beeswax. Energy Content and Resources: When we teach the elementary school students about this we use the elementary version of the transportation fuel info book from NEED. We emphasize the connection between transportation fuel use and food choices. Student Leadership: Students do all the seeding and transplanting to raise the plants in the greenhouse. We volunteer on the days of the plant sales to answer people s questions in the greenhouse and help them carry things. We plant the garden at school and harvest and weigh the produce. Evaluation: We donated hundreds of pounds of food to the food pantries in our town.
Water Festival Goals: To teach young elementary school children the importance of protecting the environment and the importance of resource conservation through activities and other games. Activities: Every year the Scituate High School NEED Club volunteers for the Northern Rhode Island Conservation District and The Providence Water Supply Board by setting up Water Festival at Camp Aldersgate. In addition to those activities, the NEED Club presented its first annual Taterthon in which the elementary school children were given their very own potato to grow and take care of. For the next 6 months, the students had to document their results in the scientific notebook they were given and report their findings. Energy Content: Over 300 elementary children from the surrounding school districts participated in game such as Scoop the Poop, Water Drop Roll, and The Watershed Parachute Game. These games taught children ways to protect the environment from harmful waste found in everyday life. For the Taterthon portion we gave multiple presetations about the link between energy and food transportation fuels. Student Leadership: We created a video to help in our presentation about Taterthon. We setup an assembly line with our team and put together kits for student participants. Evaluation: Students were engaged in the whole event and had lots of fun!
Recycling Ink Cartridges Goals: To save energy and petroleum by recycling ink cartridges for our school. Activities and tasks: We spread the word at school to teachers that we would collect any ink cartridges and recycle them. We give them to a local group that gets some money for them and they put that money into the Scituate Scholarship Fund Energy Content and Resources: The ink cartridges have metals and plastics in them and they are expensive to make. So we help to get them recycled & reused. Student Leadership: Club members collect cartridges from different parts of the school and bring them to Ms. D s room until the recycling company comes at the end of the year. Evaluation: We collected hundreds so far this year!
Community Outreach at the Hope School 5K Goals: To teach community members about the science of energy To get kids interested in energy and NEED Activities and tasks: We set up several activities for children at the race to explore the science of energy. We asked them questions to help them figure out how things worked. We explained motors and generators and the radiometer. We helped the little ones make solar bracelets. Energy Content and Resources: Our stations included the apple battery, solar beads, radiometer & cans, motors and generators, and photovoltaics. Student Leadership: Brooke led this day, and Joe helped a little too. Evaluation: Many kids visited our table and tried out our energy stations. They were excited to tell their parents what they did.
What Can One Person Do? Goals: to help everyone see that they can make a difference and improve our world Activities and tasks: We asked people to share one idea that a person could do to make a difference related to energy and the environment, we recorded these ideas and put them into a video so we could share it; we used our web page and the facebook page that the club started two years ago to share these ideas http://scituatescience.com/need-project.php https://www.facebook.com/whatcanoneperson.do Energy Content and Resources: We shared lots of energy saving tips with people to help them decide what they wanted to share in their video clip or on their card that they wrote. Some students got their ideas from NEED s Monitoring and Mentoring. Student Leadership: Team members took turns interviewing people to be part of our video. Our partners from Calcutt School also sent in videos. Evaluation: Momentum is building again with this project with lots of our peers coming down to make videos. We will present about this project at this year s water festival.
Community Education and Involvement: NEED kids are good citizens! All year, we worked to get other people involved in our activities. We worked with elementary school students from Coventry and middle school students from Providence at our student-led workshops. We worked with third graders from Scituate, Foster, and Gloster at the Water Festival. We worked with middle and high school students from Central Falls as well as lots of professionals who were volunteers and sponsors at Operation Tree-Hugger. We talked with the public at our table at the Hope School 5K and at our plant sales. We interacted with the community through our donations to the food bank at Trinity Church. We worked with a local Boy Scout Troop as they helped us to rebuild the raised bed gardens at our school. We helped the three elementary schools in our town by rebuilding the raised bed gardens at their schools. Through Taterthon we reached hundreds of elementary school students and their parents. We sent plants that we grew to several community gardens and schools.
Hours Contributed and People Reached Joe P designed our shirt this year! Thanks JOE! Task Name Hours Paarticipants Total Hours People reached (avoid duplication) Planting at Scituate elementary schools 3 3 9 80 Garden bed reconstruction and installation at Hope, Clayville, and North Scituate Elementary New garden bed construction and installation for Tiogue school 8 14 112 3 12 36 Help with Planting at Western Coventry Elementary 4 1 4 64 Garden bed reconstruction, High School 5 8 40 8 Weekly meetings 27 21 567 Extra practice sessions for workshops 1 21 21 Workshop set up 1 19 19 NEED conferences that we hosted 12 21 252 136 Other NEED workshops where we helped 12 2 24 75 Water Festival (May, 2015) 6 19 114 330 Plant Sale Fundraisers 8 5 40 article in Foster Home 11500Journal Veggies/Plant Deliveries to Local Food Closet & 4 2 8 community gardens 7 Taterthon Kit prep 3 22 66 Taterthon video and outreach 3 22 66 Youtube, website, Kent 4200County Times America the Beautiful grant & project 9 19 171 channel 10 is 64500, Observer is 17000, 84,500Pawtucket Times is 3000 Planting seeds & transplanting seedlings for plant sales and for all the gardens 22 15 330 What Can One Person Do Campaign 0.2 34 6.8 tee shirt design 3 1 3 worm farming, initial training 1 21 21 table at 5K at Hope School 3 3 9 300 Totals: 138.2 285 1246 101370 120 50 Notes Facebook and Youtube