Green Schools: Five Lessons Learned the Hard Way
Editor’s Note: This post is for the Green Moms Carnival on Green Schools, which will appear here at OrganicMania on Tuesday, August 11th. There will be great contributions from green women bloggers from all around the country, weighing in on green schools – from nursery school to college!
It seems like just yesterday that I squeezed into a seat at the kid-size cafeteria tables at my son’s new elementary school. I was there to participate in my very first PTA meeting, and while I was interested in many of the things going on at the school, what I really wanted to learn about were the school’s environmental initiatives. I wanted to get involved in the Green Committee.
Imagine my surprise when the PTA leadership didn’t seem to understand what I was talking about. They invited me to become involved with the committee that watered the trees over the summer. Oh, and they really wanted some help with a children’s garden.
But I’m not much of a gardener. I may feel green, but my plants are brown. I wanted to focus on environmental issues like substituting conventional school cleaning products with more environmentally friendly options; introducing waste-free lunches; eliminating the throw-away styrofoam trays used in our lunchroom; replacing Sally Foster fundraisers with more eco-friendly options; and stopping the Cheap Plastic Crap giveaways used at school fundraisers. And that was just for starters! Then I could see moving on to including walkable schools in our County and State Carbon Reduction Programs, retrofitting the school with solar or wind power, and more…
I think the other committee members went into overload just listening to my wish list. Our principal suggested that the new parents hold back and watch and learn what went on at the school instead of jumping in with a million new directions. So I did what comes unnaturally to this Jersey girl: I shut my mouth.
After the meeting, several other of the incoming parents approached me and said they understood and supported what I was proposing, and would be glad to help. The problem was that no one wanted to lead the effort. No one could seem to find the time. I agreed to co-chair a committee, but soon found that coordinating with a co-chair and getting the committee off the ground fell by the wayside as I focused more of my energy on work, home, family, other volunteer work, OrganicMania, and the Green Moms Carnival.
I blogged a bit about my Green Mom Culture Shock during this time and how I was Dealing with the Schools: Coping as a Green Mom…but then I went all quiet on you. Didn’t say too much about what was going on…
So did we make progress this last school year? Yes, but not nearly as much as I would have liked. I did learn a few lessons, though, which I’m happy to share with other eager parents as they seek to navigate the new world of PTAs and public schools. What about you? What’s worked for you? Please leave a message and share, because the new school year is about to start up and we can all learn from each others’ experiences. What’s worked for you as you’ve sought to green your school?
Lesson #1: Meet People Where They Are
Only months after that first meeting did I learn that the existing gardening committee had plenty of “greenies” involved who would have been happy to take on many of the other issues I proposed. And had I volunteered first with that committee, proved myself, and learned how things worked at the school, our Green Committee probably would have had more impact.
Lesson #2 Get Support from Area Non-Profits
Through the Green Schools committee of my town’s sustainable communities initiative, Bethesda Green, I learned that the Audobon Society’s Green Schools Initiative was trying to reduce waste at my son’s school. Several of the other committee members were from my son’s school, and we were encouraged us to go back and try again with the Green Committee, or just to do things on our own as we could fit them in. The woman who led the charge? Probably the busiest one among us – she has triplets!
Lesson #3 Seek out Liked Minded Allies in the School Early On
Through the Green Schools committee, I met a teacher from my son’s school. She was able to shed some light on mysteries like WHY the class buying lists contained so many plastic items, and how to get that changed for the next school year.
She was also able to explain that there were a bunch of different Green initiatives going on at school that would have more reach and impact if they were coordinated. Coincidentally, I heard the same thing from the PTA president at that time. Soon we were able to get things a bit better organized, and on much sounder footing for this coming school year.
Having friends “on the inside” of the school really helps!
Lesson #4 Connect with other Local Schools and Learn What’s Worked There
Some of the other schools here in Bethesda, Maryland have had far greater participation in their “Waste-Free Wednesday” lunch campaigns than we did with ours. It may just take time for new ideas to take root, but it would have been ideal if we could have touched base with the green leaders at our town’s other schools to see how they achieved so much success. Thanks to our community-wide Green Schools initiative, we’ll be connecting with those other green school leaders soon.
Lesson #5 Propose Well Thought-Out Alternatives
It’s not enough to say, “Get rid of the traditional school fundraising programs and all of the “stuff” that they push on people!” When well established fund raising programs are bringing in $20K or so for the PTA, you’ve got to have a plan to replace that money. There are many new green school fundraising programs emerging, but how much money are schools actually making from these programs? That’s one question I haven’t yet been able to answer to our PTA’s satisfaction. (Perhaps a kind reader will leave a comment here with that information!)
What about you? What’s worked and what hasn’t worked as you’ve sought to “green” your neighborhood schools? Please leave comment and share!
Lynn
Copyright OrganicMania 2009
Filed under Bethesda, Green Charities, Green Ideas & Stuff, Green moms, Green Moms Carnival Home Page & Calendar, Green Schools, School lunches, Tips | Wordpress Comments (12) |How to Pack A Cheap and Easy Waste-Free Lunch
There are many eco-friendly options available for school lunch, but let’s face it: most of them are still pretty pricey. Shelling out $21 for a Sigg water bottle or $37.95 for a Laptop lunch box adds up to big bucks quickly.
The very popular Sigg bottles range in price from $17.99 to $24.99 at this Bethesda Whole Foods.
Here are five super cheap, easy ways you can send your kids back-to-school with an eco-friendly lunch bag. If you’re fortunate enough to have what you need already, maybe you could take this post and send it to a school list serv or to others who might find this information helpful.
There are really just five things you need for a waste-free lunch:
1. Lunch box – or brown bag. While there are great eco-friendly lunch box options out there, most range from $14 on up. You can buy a pack of 100 brown paper lunch bags for $1.99. No, it’s not totally waste-free, but most municipalities recycle paper – so you can toss the bag out with the newspapers to be recycled! It’s a much more environmentally friendly option than buying a conventional school lunch bag, which are often made of PVC plastic. Read here to learn why you want to avoid PVC, which is harmful to our health and to the environment.
As seen in a Bethesda Safeway, buy 2 packages for $3.98 and you'll have enough recyclable brown bags for the entire school year.
2. Water bottles. This is a biggie. Visit nearly any school cafeteria and you’ll see a staggering amount of waste from disposable juice boxes and milk containers. Yet most stainless or non-PVC water bottles are $10 and up – some as high as $25 or more. Before I invested in two Sigg Mr. Sharky’s (pictured below), I used a good ole Honest Tea bottle. Made of durable glass, it was fine for drinks on the go. I still use one in a pinch!
A durable glass bottle, such as this Honest Tea bottle, can be reused as an on-the-go water bottle.
3. Cloth napkin. No need to buy new here. Pretty much everyone has a spare dish rag or dish towel lying around the house, or some “good” cloth napkins that are only taken out for “special occasions.” These are perfect for school lunch. So far, my son hasn’t asked why he carries a linen dishcloth with a 1977 calendar on it, but I’m sure that day is coming soon…!
Yes, that's my mother's calendar dish towel from 1977, now doubling as a napkin in my son's lunch box. Do I get a Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, Refuse award for this?
4. Food containers. My how things have changed just in the past year. Now you can buy stainless steel containers for school lunch. But again, cost is an issue. If you don’t want to spend $40 for an all-in-one lunch kit or $16 for a stainless steel food container, you can go the el cheapo route like I did.
Three of these glass Pyrex food storage units sell for just $4.99 at a Bethesda Giant Food store.
Unfortunately there are no more of these nifty $4.99 glass pyrex containers at the Bethesda Giant, because I bought out their entire stock!
And here’s a shot of Big Boy with his lunch bag, which contains some plastic (gasp) Gerber food containers. I love these. They’re made in the good old USA, they’re cheap (under $5 for 4 small dishes) and they’re made of #5 plastic, which does not contain BPA. Still, to be on the safe side (because all plastics can leach) I keep these plastic bowls out of the dishwasher and the microwave I had to search high and low for these – they seem to sell out as soon as they’re in stock, but you can sometimes find them at Target or Buy Buy Baby.
He’s also carrying a more traditional “Green Mom” accoutrement – a Wrap n’ Mat sandwich wrap, which is made of washable cloth and durable, low density polyethylene (LDPE). These sell for $7.99 on the Internet, but I bought mine locally at My Organic Market. When I hit the Wrap n’ Mat website as I was writing this post, I learned that they’ve just introduced little snack pouches, which sell for $8.99 each.
5. Cutlery. This past school year I packed lunches with our regular cutlery, and unfortunately I regret it because some of our silverware never made it home. This year I’m trying Sporks !
And I leave you with a picture of my boys’ trusty Crocodile Creek lunch bags being cleaned out. Because this frugal green Mom isn’t planning to buy new ones this year!
This post is for the Green Moms Carnival: Green Schools Edition, which runs tomorrow (Monday, August 10th) right here at OrganicMania.
— Copyright 2009 OrganicMania
Filed under Bethesda, Food, Giant, Green moms, Green Schools, My Organic Market, Product Recommendations, Savings Tips, School lunches, Sustainable Packaging, Tips, Whole Foods | Wordpress Comments (13) |Dealing with the Schools: Coping as a Green Mom
It’s not often that I’m taken by surprise, since I tend to research issues to death. But want to know the reason there have been so few posts of late? It’s this back to school thing. I honestly thought that my life would get easier when my son started first grade at the local public school. Instead, I feel like I have another job.
Between morning melt downs, afternoon crying fits, folders stuffed full of papers to be reviewed by a responsible parental unit, and my continued Green Mom Culture Shock at the many environmentally unfriendly practices common to one of the most progressive school systems in the country – well, I’ve been exhausted!
For nearly a year now, but never more so than since the launch of the Green Moms Carnival, I’ve enjoyed the company of a like-minded sisterhood of Green Moms. These sympathetic souls include Green Moms with college-age kids– La Marguerite, Karen Hanrahan, Anna from GreenTalk and Diane MacEachern – as well as many with elementary school age kids like my Big Boy – the Not Quite Crunchy Parent, Surely You Nest, Sommer from Green and Clean Mom and even a few like me, still dealing with diapers – Alana from Gray Matters holding the honor of having the youngest baby among us.
Between the Green Moms in the blogosphere, the Green Parents who find their way to leave wonderful comments on OrganicMania, and my growing list of wonderful green clients, I thought that Green was everywhere.
Well, Green is not everywhere. So here I am, trying to figure which issue to address first. The mandatory plastic ziplock bags? The throw-away Styrofoam trays? The forced bussing past shuttered schools? The high fructose corn syrup laden lollypops handed out by my son’s math teacher? The cheap plastic crap toys given as rewards for good behavior? The environmentally unfriendly school fundraisers?
Hey Green Moms, how are you doing in week three of back-to-school? And have you been successful in “taking on” any of the environmentally unfriendly practices at your local schools?
And, yes, I am co-chairing the school’s Green Committee, so my question is serious. For those of you who have been successful at bringing about change, what’s worked? And what hasn’t worked?
— Lynn
Filed under Green moms, Green Schools | Wordpress Comments (8) |Green Mom Culture Shock: Back to School
As a seasoned mother of a six-year-old and a nearly two-year-old, I thought I was past the point where much could shock me. But then school started.
And suddenly I went from the friendly confines of the Green Mom blogosphere to the public school system, where teachers routinely send home “supply lists” containing environmentally unfriendly items such as (gasp) plastic ziplock bags and Purell hand sanitizer (2 bottles, please!), where students use thousands of styrofoam lunch trays each day, and where fossil fuels are burned sending children to school on buses that drive past shuttered schools near the bus stops.
I feel like a creature in a strange land.
How’s it going in your world?
— Lynn
Correction: This post originally stated that the styrofoam trays were thrown away. That is incorrect. They are re-used and then after they break are sent to the incinerator.
Filed under Green Ideas & Stuff, Green moms, Green Schools | Wordpress Comments (17) |
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