CTE Project: Conservation Through Education
Success of the Energy Audit program provided the impetus for expansion of the program into other schools within the district. To do this the class formed an after school Green Team in the fall of 2008. The main focus of the team in its year of inception was to assist students in CHAMPS, an after-school enrichment program, at Harding Elementary in performing their own energy audit and subsequent conservation measures. The project at Harding was used to develop a model, which could then be used for student-driven energy audits at other schools.
The model is thus:
Meeting One: a round-table discussion was held amongst students to learn about resource use at Harding and to determine prior knowledge and introduce the audit procedure
Meeting Two: a tour of building with the chief engineer to assess lighting patterns Three committees were developed:
- Lighting Committee: counted light bulbs in hallways and stairwells, and distributed flyers to individual classrooms. Students then counted the light bulbs and calculated the number of kilowatt hours used in each classroom.
- Recommendation Committee: used light meters to establish the proper configurations to achieve 40-45 foot-candles of light as suggested by the Erie County Health Department.
- Data Entry Committee: entered three years of heating and electrical data and general information into EnergyStar.gov. Committees gathered to present recommendations to the faculty and to the student body. Data will be monitored for one year to determine the success of the project.
Future plans include energy audits for other schools in the Erie City School District.