Green School Grants - New Brunswick

"It's estimated that by the end of the sixth grade, a student will have spent, on average, 2,000 hours in the schoolyard," says Linda Dempsey, the Community School Coordinator at Cambridge Narrows Community School in New Brunswick.

Dempsey also coordinates the school's environmental club, which has teamed up with Nature New Brunswick and the Canaan-Washademoak Watershed Association to work on sustainability projects in both the school and the community. Their collective goal, says Dempsey, is to create change.

This year, that change-making is focused on the schoolyard. "Creating a habitat will transform the schoolyard," says Dempsey, "into a zone of wonder and discovery, where students can explore the natural world and create a connection to it."

The grant will pay for a greenhouse, a weather station, perennial beds, benches, and bird feeders, but the details of what gets selected for where are from worked out, and that's one of the points of the project. "We'll work with students to determine what types of habitat they want to establish," says Dempsey, "and teachers will determine how this is worked into the curriculum." At this point, there are plans for a walkabout on school grounds to look at potential sites and brainstorming sessions to consider features. Then, students will be invited to sketch their ideas, enter them into a schoolyard habitat contest, and vote on which installation they want.

Eventually, the project will create what Dempsey calls "nature pockets" that provide a habitat for local wildlife and collect runoff. She hopes that by helping transform what, up to now, has been a collection of buildings, parking lots, and playing fields, students will take the first step towards stewardship.

In 2011, Sussex Regional High School in Sussex, New Brunswick, held a sustainable building competition that, according to science teacher Jeffrey Gaunce, went over big. And Gaunce says the students agreed. "One of my buddies…this is actually the course I've seen him attend the most out of the 13 years we've been going to school," said one student. Not only were the high-schoolers engaged, they also learned important lessons. As another participant said, "I always thought that if you wanted to watch TV, you just had to plug it in, but now I realize how much it costs and where it comes from."

Comments like that inspired Gaunce to coordinate the second annual competition, judged by staff from the Gaia project, along with representatives of the province's departments of environment and education. They'll be assessing small, off-grid buildings designed and constructed by students on school grounds, for the purposes of a night spent playing video games. Students at Sussex Regional will compete with students from four other New Brunswick high schools, and the grant will cover building materials for one building at each of the schools.

The funds will also pay for insulation and heating systems. Unlike in the first competition, "buildings will compete against each other based on relative performance that considers local climate," says Gaunce. This will make an already complex and challenging contest even more so – and that's the idea. "Students participate in all parts of this competition," says Gaunce, "from planning, testing, budgeting, and construction to, finally, deciding what will happen to the building after the day of competition. They'll be learning hands-on that sustainability is complex."

"We have been given so much," says Matt McGuire, who teaches Grade 4 at Kingsclear Consolidated, a small, community-based school of just 115 students in Fredericton, N.B. "We are very fortunate to enjoy the beautiful weather, wilderness and recreational benefits of New Brunswick."

McGuire describes himself as a passionate "green" teacher, and his 18 students as environmentally driven. "We understand that the kind of lifestyle we have is precious and can only be enjoyed by the people who give back to this beautiful earth we live on," says McGuire.

That's why, after measuring their waste and reducing it through a successful composting program, "KCS students are ready to take 'green' and 'community' to a new level," says McGuire. "Our composter is really working overtime and we were waiting all winter for Mother Nature to thaw and allow us to use our composted materials to plant a community garden," he says. "We will be bringing our fruit composting, etc., to fruition!"

Funds from the grant will allow McGuire and his students to buy gardening tools and supplies. The students will till the earth, plant the garden and maintain it until summer dismissal. The fruits and vegetables harvested will be distributed to nearby homes. "We hope that our efforts will encourage our community families to continue the upkeep of the garden throughout the summer."

"Many of the residents in our region are famers," says Beth Weatherbee, who teaches at Port Elgin Regional School in New Brunswick. It's no surprise, then, when she adds, "Many of our students love the concept of working with their hands, outdoors on the land."

In fact, according to Weatherbee, the idea for Port Elgin Regional's WWF-Canada Green CommUnity's School Grants project came from the Grade 8 Green Group students themselves  "they requested that a composting program be started here at the school," she says, and "they've begun to do the necessary legwork to make this a reality."

The students have written press releases for the school newsletter and made announcements in the school building about the importance of separating wet and dry waste properly so that less ends up in landfill. With funds from the grant, they'll buy two composters, along with the tools they'll need to turn the compost into a school pumpkin patch, from a wheelbarrow to a rake, spade and hoe.

Weatherbee says the Green Group members are already advocates for the environment, eager to join the army of eco-warriors. "These students are passionate about becoming a small part of the solution. They hope to instill the desire in all of our students to advocate for the preservation of a healthy planet." The Green Group has even adopted its own motto: "Because we care."

"Fisheries, as a resource, are facing many issues around the world, and New Brunswick is home to some of the best fisheries in the world," says Hardy Cameron, a teacher at Hampton High School in Hampton, New Brunswick.

Hampton is on the Kennebecasis River. With help from this grant, Cameron  who before becoming a teacher worked for both Fisheries and Oceans Canada and Conservation Ontario  is setting up his school's own small fishery on the river: The Hampton High School Fly Fishing and Angling Club.

The grant will fund rods, nets, and fly-tying kits, as well as hip waders so students can stride out into the water for hands-on learning about watershed conservation.

"We need to promote fisheries education," says Cameron, "and by creating anglers who are aware of these resources, it becomes personal. The days of being passive when it comes to environmental issues are numbered, and this club will see to that."

Hampton High's club is the fifth school in the province to set up a fishing club, and Cameron is looking forward to helping build what he calls a network of awareness since, as he says, "A sustainable environment begins not with enforcement but education."

Cameron hopes that students will take the messages they learn in the club home and out into the community. "We aim to ensure that the generations of tomorrow will feel an obligation to protect the environments that their very lives depend on."

"We need to start thinking ahead to find realistic solutions to the climate change problem," says Keith Armstrong, who teaches carpentry and technology at Simonds High School in Saint John, N.B.

From his experience as a teacher, a licensed carpenter and an advocate of sustainable energy, Armstrong has a clear idea of the kind of solutions we need. "We want our students to demand data-informed solutions that are economically and environmentally realistic."

That's why Armstrong is coordinating a student-led energy efficient buildings competition, in partnership with the Gaia Project and two other New Brunswick high schools. "The goal of the competition," says Armstrong, "is to have students experimentally determine the most energy efficient design for a small, off-grid building and, using this data, to build one."

The grant will fund raw building materials, doors, windows, insulation, electrical wiring and ventilation and heating systems for three buildings (one for each of the competing schools). Once the buildings are constructed, "a couple of students will then spend the night in their unit, which will be continuously monitored," says Armstrong.

According to Armstrong, six other schools are already interested in participating in a competition for the 2011-2012 school year, which means that the project doesn't end once this year's winner is chosen. "Students will be involved in planning the competition for next year by thinking of ways to reuse materials from year to year."

"Trees are nature's air filters and help purify our atmosphere," says Kerry Underhill, a teacher at Lakefield Elementary School in Quispamsis, New Burnswick. "The more trees we can plant, the better and healthier our community will be."

Underhill is putting her convictions to work in Lakefield's school grounds with a project to create a green space filled with shrubs, flowers, vegetables " and, of course, trees.

While the children will be planting some seedlings inside and nurturing them until they're ready to go into the ground after the last frost, there's no need to wait until next spring for the trees that the grant will fund, says Underhill. "The trees can be purchased and planted right away, in September, so that the children can see the tree's cycle of life throughout the winter and then the transition and budding in spring."

Tracking that cycle will benefit the students, Underhill believes, "by giving them an appreciation for the beauty of trees and an awareness of the role that trees play here on our planet."

Underhill is looking forward to creating a flourishing and welcoming space that she can already picture clearly. "I see birds and squirrels and families sitting on benches admiring our hard work," she says. "I see families from other neighbourhoods coming to see our gorgeous, healthy green space!"