This spring, Oakwood participated in Renew Our Schools, a youth engagement program and competition in which schools use real-time energy data to evaluate and reduce their energy consumption.
In this competition, the more energy you save, the more points you earn, and students earned points based on two key components:
- Measured savings, determined through eGauge energy monitors, brought about by behavioral changes such as turning off lights, setting computers to power save mode and removing unnecessary appliances.
- School energy actions that entailed projects that include audits of energy use, a student-created video that demonstrates your school’s efforts and actions, the creation of energy conservation lesson plans, creative campaigns, etc.
Throughout the program, which lasted approximately 6 weeks, students at both the Elementary and Secondary campuses took this challenge seriously, winning accolades from the program directors, who offered inspiring feedback to Oakwood along the way:
- “These goals are incredible! I am very impressed with what your students want to accomplish! I am really impressed with how your school has tackled this whole thing. “
- “This is awesome! Everyone worked together so much in your school—and that is why you were successful!”
- “I LOVE that you discovered that students do better under natural light.”
- “You guys are killing it!”
We are thrilled to announce that the students’ tremendous efforts paid off, with both the elementary campus and the secondary campus placing high in their respective national divisions: Oakwood Elementary ended the competition in third place, and Oakwood Secondary topped the list of energy savers with a first-place spot.
According to Director of Experiential Learning Phu Tranchi, who—along with the support of the business and facilities departments—helped to bring the program to our school, the eGauge monitors will now stay on campus so that students can continue environmentally conscious efforts to reduce our resource usage and make recommendations to the school for the future. Other potential plans also include the incorporation of sustainability workshops into our Community Youth Partnership program.
Congratulations to all of the students, faculty, and administrators who participated in this project and special recognition to the leaders of the ECO club who led this charge: 9th graders Sascha and Naomi, and 10th grader Cate. Click play on the video below to watch them present their secondary campus work:
