There are currently a number of increasingly significant environmental concerns and threats to the future of society, and by being more energy efficient, schools can help prevent greenhouse gas emissions and improve the students' learning environment. School districts can and have used the savings from improved energy performance to help pay for…

By using an energy audit, the Cheyenne Mountain School District No. 12 (Colorado) identified fuel-consuming areas in its schools and reduced the annual increases for fuel from 25 to 5 percent. Six steps to energy savings will work for other districts as well. (JW)

With the aid of a federal grant for energy conservation, the Warren Consolidated School System (Michigan) will purchase a Margaux 6400 Building Management system to manage energy usage in 35 district buildings. Reasons for selecting the system and system capabilities are briefly discussed. (Author/JN)

Through a collaborative project in Pennsylvania, high school students developed a method for converting batches of their cafeteria's waste fryer oil into biodiesel using a 190 L (50 gal) reactor. While the biodiesel is used to supplement the school district's heating and transportation energy needs, the byproduct--glycerol--is used to make hand…

In Tanzania, the education system focuses on schools and teachers as key educators of children, while little attention is paid to the home environment. This study examines motivational factors that may influence parental involvement at home and at school, using Hoover-Dempsey and Sandler's model of parental involvement as a theoretical framework.…

There are deep and often institutionalized root causes for persistent equity gaps in postsecondary access and attainment in the United States. Many data sources, as well as the dozens of practitioners interviewed for this paper, affirm this. The majority of K-12 public school students are now students of color, and the U.S. Census Bureau estimates…

This phenomenological study analyzed perceptions of elementary principals of new teachers' efficacy and capacity in classroom management. The study was conducted to inform teacher preparation programs about critical classroom management needs that could be addressed at the undergraduate level. Results of the semi-structured interviews indicated…

This paper presents a revised learning progression for the energy concept and initial findings on diverse progressions among subgroups of sample students. The revised learning progression describes how students progress towards an understanding of the energy concept along two progress variables identified from previous studies--key ideas about…

In 1980, the Colorado State Board of Education adopted amendments which allowed school districts to modify their school calendars to reduce energy consumption. Fourteen school districts applied for and received permission for pilot programs reducing the school week from five to four days. (Author/CM)

This essay contends that personalized professional learning can support the shift towards a culture of personalized learning at the middle school level, with the potential to make a district-wide impact. If you have ever worked in a middle school, you would agree there is a sense magic and contagious energy within middle school students. Middle…

A school district energy management program reduced oil consumption 34 percent and electrical consumption 20 percent. Low cost modifications to the heating and ventilating equipment in the schools resulted in energy savings that "paid back" the labor plus material costs in less than a year. Each building was placed into an energy…

Features shared by successful school energy conservation programs include: (1) the formation of a district energy conservation committee that involves as many segments of the educational community as practical, (2) the assignment of specific responsibilities to specific individuals, (3) careful planning in the development of guidelines, (4)…

A student committee whose main duty is changing light bulbs may sound like the punch line to a bad joke, but as the students and faculty at Montgomery County Public Schools (MCPS) in Rockville, MD, know, changing a light bulb is no laughing matter. As part of the district's green initiative, all standard incandescent and fluorescent light bulbs…

Makes several recommendations for energy conservation in a school district and suggests that financial savings be shared with the students as an incentive program. (WM)

Swedens necessity for and present efforts toward energy conservation are discussed. The district system for space heating and certain Swedish laws that promote energy conservation are described. (MDR)