Model named a Green and Healthy School

Bryan Marshall
Register News Writer

FRANKFORT May 12, 2008 08:24 am

— Model Laboratory School was one of 53 schools across the state recognized Tuesday for joining a new program designed to make significant health and environmental improvements.
Through the Web-based Kentucky Green and Healthy Schools program, students complete health and environmental inventories of their school buildings in nine areas, including health and safety, water, transportation, energy, indoor air quality, green spaces, instructional leadership, hazardous chemicals and solid waste.
Once students complete an inventory, they review it to identify potential areas for improvement and conduct a project to make the school more efficient and healthy.
“This is an initiative that gets schools thinking about energy conservation, water conservation and sustainable practices,” said Susan Neumann, a Model High School teacher. “It’s a really neat program.”
“The most value in this is the students are actively problem solving,” she said. “They’re making a difference.”
Model, which was first to join the program, will receive $500 toward their initiatives, along with the other first 19 schools to sign up.
After receiving training at a workshop, Neumann and several other Model teachers did an inventory of the school to assess air quality.
“You walk around and look at what needs to be done and what are some of the issues and problems,” she said. “Then, you research and try to come up with ideas about how to change things. A lot of that is coming up with money.”
“A lot of the vents are covered up by the trees,” Neumann said about problems the assessment uncovered. “They don’t have that clearance that they should. There are a lot of areas that have standing water. That’s a problem for mold. The wood room doesn’t have proper ventilation.”
Neumann’s high school classes also performed an energy audit of the school to determine how many computers, refrigerators, copiers and other electrical appliances the school had.
“One of the big things we were looking at was phantom energy, which is energy machines use even when they’re turned off,” she said. “With a computer, when you turn it off, it still drains from the wall. Supposedly, 10 percent of people’s energy bills are because they don’t unplug things. So, we were looking at a plan that would reduce the amount of time computers are on in the school.”
The school is only in the beginning stages in terms of making the building more environmentally friendly, Neumann said.
“We’ve basically been doing a lot of planning this year and getting the team together,” she said. “Next year, we plan to meet as a group and coordinate this throughout the school.”
Bryan Marshall can be reached at bmarshall@richmondregister.com or 624-6691.