SAGE Dining Organic Garden - Students Growing Strong

You may think planting an organic garden is just about eating vegetables that are grown and nurtured without the use of pesticides.  Here in our link section is a Vimeo link to a video about the green garden at the Pine Crest School Boca Raton Campus.  The Lower School (Pre-K-Grade 5) Building was built a couple of years ago and has been certified LEED Gold.  The architects created a green garden and cisterns in the design plan for the school.  As you can see their food director has taken it to a new level!  See how planting and growing an organic garden on YOUR school campus can be used as a teaching tool and integrated into your school’s curriculum!

How Can An Older School Go Green and What is LEED Anyway?

A Comment I have heard many people make is, “How How can I help my school go "green" if it was not build according to the LEED process?  Additionally when I am discussing green school issues I'm often asked to explain the meaning of the acronym, “LEED”.  LEED stands for Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design, an internationally recognized green building certification System.  There are four different levels of LEED certification:  LEED Certified, Silver, Gold and Platinum.  In May of 2008 the School District of Palm Beach County decided to build all new schools to the LEED Silver standard as a minimum guideline.  Many people are unaware of the standard, LEED EB (OM), which stands for LEED for Existing Buildings (Operations & Maintenance).  Even if your school was not built according to LEED standards and is an older school, going "green" is not only possible, it's very easy to take the first steps!  As of last year the School District of Palm Beach has registered the first K-12 school in the state for LEED EB accreditation.  Your school may not have been built according to LEED standards; nonetheless, you can take many steps towards helping your school go "green".  Remember the first steps towards going "green" are; Reduce, Re-Use, and Recycle!

Contact Us For Palm Beach County Green Schools Information

As volunteer members of the USGBC Green Schools Committee we are here to help!  Please send us an email (see field below) and let us know how we can help your school go green.  We can be a Mentor to your school and guide you by suggesting both starting steps towards going green as well as advanced methodologies, depending upon how far along your school is in the process.  Whether you are in the beginning process of recycling efforts, planting a butterfly garden, or finding ways to conserve energy we can help.  

Welcome to our new blog!  It is our goal to provide support to schools that are trying to go “green”.  This blog has been posted by members of the USGBC (US Green Building Council) Palm Beach Green Schools Committee in an effort to assist school administrators, teachers, and students in their efforts to make schools an environmentally responsible and healthy place to work and learn. 

By transforming the physical environment of a learning institution, we have the ability to impact students, teachers and communities and assist schools in saving money by saving energy and helping schools impart ecological responsibility to their students. 

We are here to provide free assistance to assist schools in reaching their green goals.  For any schools that have not yet engaged in the process of “going green” we wanted to announce our presence publicly that we are available as volunteers to help you in your quest.  We can also point schools in the direction of available green school grants.

In future blog posts you will find ways to participate connect with us, announcements of green school events and you will find a wide variety of free resources at your fingertips!