SC Green Steps Schools
2020-2021 projects
Conserve: Energy
Students create and display "Lights Off" signs and memes to be used as reminders to turn off lights in classrooms and offices when not in use to teach awareness of energy consumption. Students will also conduct bi-monthly "audits' to determine which lights are left on in rooms not in use. The data from these audits will be depicted in a graph and displayed in the areas of the school where the "Lights Off" signs/memes are displayed.
Conserve: Recycle
Students collect classroom and common area recycling each week and post facts and statistics to teach the difference recycling can make. Each week the weight of recycling collected will be calculated and displayed on posters in the Commons areas throughout the school.
Protect: Air
Students propagate and pot effective air quality plants in decorated upcycled planters and deliver to teachers and staff to place in their homes along with information about how these plants remove toxins from the air.
Protect: Litter Prevention
Students pick up litter around campus and create and post signs to discourage littering. The students will focus on a different area of the school each week to collect litter from. The weight of the litter picked up and the location of the pickup will be written on posters and signs throughout the school to spread awareness of the most heavily littered areas.
Restore: Soil Compost
Students create and maintain compost bins outside of the classroom. Compost will be used in a school garden that is maintained by the Environmental Science classes. Due to COVID protocol this year, students were no longer able to use a vermibin inside the classroom, but the outdoor composing sites are still utilized to provide compost for plants along our Bluebird trail and a garden outside of our school.
Restore: Habitat
Students maintain the blue bird trail and boxes, recording data weekly. The data will be entered into The Cornell Lab of Ornithology Nestwatcher database. Data entered will be taught in the Environmental Science classes and taught to other students and teachers through presentations on conservation and guided tours of the Bluebird trail.
Restore: Habitat
"Frog tubes" were placed throughout the campus to provide shelter to local frog species.
The school was also having an "issue" with snakes coming near the building to prey on the frogs that were preying on the insects attracted to the night lighting around the school. In hopes of solving this problem, solar lighting was added to select frog tubes to attract insects to the tubes instead of the lights outside the school (lighting>insects>frogs>snakes... tubes+lighting+shelter=attraction for frogs and insects and snakes no longer attracted to the building.
Restore: Habitat
Butterfly houses and a butterfly garden using up-cycled tires.