Examples of Social Studies Work
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Student Driven Projects!2014-2015 STEM Seminar Green School Presentations STEM Freshman Seminar January 23, 2015 Student Summaries of Green School Innovations 1. Monica Rosanova: Increasing Solar Panel Efficiency I chose the topic of solar energy and I was instructed to perform an experiment related to my topic. I was curious about the effect of temperature on solar panels. I recorded the voltage of a generic solar panel at a warm and cold temperature. I came to a conclusion that cold temperatures increase the voltage of solar panels, which makes it more efficient. According to my data, 20% increase of energy can be produced by lowering the temperature of a solar panel. In addition to creating an experiment, I was required to do some research on the school’s solar panels and energy. The seven-acre solar field produces about 1.6 megawatts of emission free electricity. The solar field is shared between Kent County High School, KCHS Radio Antenna, Worton Elementary School, Community Center, and Kent County Public Works Facility. I had to think of an innovation for the solar panels, I decided to add a cooling system to the solar panels, water will circulate through them to maintain an ideal constant temperature. I contacted Mr. Briggs Cunningham from Washington College, and he told me that he has several grants in mind, however he did not go into detail with them. 2. Caroline MacLeod: Energy Efficient Lighting For my Green School Project, I researched how to make the lighting in our school more energy efficient. Making the lightbulbs in our school more energy efficient will benefit our school and the environment. The lightbulbs we currently use contain 1.4g of mercury, which enters the ecosystem after disposing of these lightbulbs. Mercury is destructive to our bodies and the animals living in our environment, causing the toxin to get passed up the food chain. The LED light bulbs last twice as long as our current Fluorescents, and use much less electricity. As my experiment for my Green School Project, I tested the brightness of two types of bulbs; Compact Fluorescent and Light Emitting Diodes. As a result, I learned that LED bulbs are much brighter than our CFL, allowing us to buy less of them, because they give off larger ranges of light. In order to pay for this expensive project, I contacted a company that was able to get energy efficient lights installed in their whole building. They were able to email me a website (EmPower Maryland) that offers a program; Public Schools Energy Efficiency Initiative Engineering Design Program. I contacted Mr. Wayne Bedwell to see how we would install lights and I am still waiting to hear from him. 3. Sarah Abec: Insulating Our Windows My green school project is to figure out how we can make our school more green, but also save us money, by insulating our windows. They would be less drafty, which will also cause the heating costs to be lower. Instead of paying for brand new insulated windows, we can buy a plastic material that insulates the window. The price to replace a window is between $150 and $300 per window, but is only $20 to insulate one. Since we have around 300 windows, plus labor costs, this will cost us around $6,000. I did an experiment, where I insulated a window and measured it’s temperature and the temperature of a non insulated window to find the difference. The difference was 4%. I contacted Mr.Wayne Bedwell, the head of maintenance and found out we pay around $200,000 for heat each year. I also learned that we use oil to heat our school, not natural gas. 4% of 200,000 is 8,000. These windows will only cost us $5,000, so we can get our money back within a year. This will make our school more environmentally friendly because we can use less oil to heat our school. 4. Elizabeth Walters: GreenShields Making transportation green in Kent County can easily be done by purchasing a product called a GreenShield. A GreenShield is a product made up of fiberglass and epoxy resin. The shield will get placed on the roof of the school bus, reducing the amount of drag exerted on the bus and decreasing fuel consumption. The buses gas mileage will improve by an estimated amount of 20%. So a bus without a GreenShield will get 8 miles per gallon, meaning a bus with a GreenShield will get 9.6 miles per gallon. Diesel at Highs gas station in Chestertown costs $2.79, to fully fill the buses 80 gallon tank it costs $223.20. Say the bus travels 500 miles a week they will go from needing 62.5 gallons of gas a week to 52.1 gallons of gas a week. Weekly fuel expense goes from $174.38 without the GreenShield to $145.36 with the GreenShield. This represents a savings of $29.02 per week. So since the GreenShield costs $500, you will be able to pay it back in around 17 weeks. You can purchase a GreenShield from their website, by contacting Jonny Cohen, the creator of the GreenShield. 5. Silas Phillips: Geothermal Energy Geothermal Energy I did my green school project on Geothermal Energy. During my research I contacted Briggs Cunningham, who is the Energy programs Manager at Washington College. Washington College has Geothermal systems installed under the baseball field, one under the Hodson Dining Hall green for that facility, one under the College's central green, Library and the main academic building, Smith Hall. The Geothermal systems at Washington College were installed by a company named Gipe Associates which is an installation company in Easton, MD.The cost of a geothermal system for Kent County High School would cost between $400,000-$500,000 without a grant. There are two grant programs that would apply to Kent County High School if we were to install a Geothermal system. One of the programs is the Residential grant program which offers a $3,000 grant and is only offered to Maryland residents. It also gives you $500 if there are damages to your eco-friendly system that need to be paid for. The second program is the Public Schools Energy Efficiency Initiative Engineering Design Program - This program allows any public school looking to install a energy efficient system to get back a percentage of the money. I performed an experiment to see how geothermal energy compared to other energy sources. To do this I had three small cups one cup that had heated soil in it to simulate Geothermal energy, another cup had nothing in it to simulate Natural gas, and a final cup was left in the sun to simulate solar energy. I put balloons over all three of the cups, and let them sit for a day and then checked to see which balloon produced the most air. 6. Tyler Cullum: Exercise Equipment in Classrooms Some students have trouble focusing in class. Sitting all day and listening to teachers, can make a student become fidgety. To fix this, exercise should be included in a student’s day. Many educators have already looked into this and have found that “exercise increases blood flow to the brain and that delivers oxygen and nutrients” (Patti Neighmond), keeping students quick-minded and focused towards the subject at hand. To get the students this exercise, schools should have exercise equipment available to the students. To benefit from this, the bikes can be modified to create electricity, which in turn could create electricity for laptops, ipads, lights, or other electronic devices. This has been done on small scales, producing one or two “green bikes”, but can become very expensive on a large scale, costing thousands of dollars. I have already contacted the carpentry department, who could help modify exercise equipment that our school already owns. 7. Zach Argo: Motion Sensors for Lighting and Security Cameras My research is on Motion Sensor Activated Lights and Cameras in our school. We already have motion sensor activated lights in our school and security cameras. My innovation idea is to find a way to combine all of these things in our school and make them more efficient to save money. I tested how long it took the lights to turn off after they were activated by the motion sensors. The lights went off after approximately five minutes, which takes up a lot more energy than we need it to, because no one was around the light that needed it. My project will find a way to make that time shorter, so we are not using as much energy and the security cameras can be included with the motion sensors so the cameras are only recording when someone walks by. The research and funding for this project can come from a grant that can pay for the research. 8. Christina Bonass: A Paperless Classroom My project is on having a paperless classroom. My idea would help make our school green, because it saves paper. This can help our school, because students and teachers feel more organized and the ebooks are less expensive and easily updated. I then had thought about the students who do not have internet at home, there are alternatives such as going to places that offer free wi-fi or using the personal hotspot on their phone. I have learned many things from this project including how many trees are cut down per year, how much we can help our students and the world, and that one little person can do something big. So in conclusion, a paperless classroom could really benefit not only our school, but also the world. 9. Julie Macchione: Outdoor Classroom For my green school project I plan to get an Outdoor Classroom for our school. Having an Outdoor Classroom for our school has many benefits. An outdoor classroom is a fun and green space for students to learn. Teachers and students have to sit inside school everyday, students would have a great opportunity to do more exploring outdoors. Students should be able to use more resources and environments to learn, that is what an outdoor classroom would provide. When the teachers are using the natural light while using the outdoor classroom, they will save electricity by leaving their classroom lights off for the day. The cost to construct the outdoor classroom is about $2,500. To help pay for this cost, there is a grant called Lowe’s Toolbox for Education that will donate $2,000 - $5,000 to help build an outdoor learning space. 10. Alison Rameika: Green Roof Our school system is always looking for ways to save electricity. My solution for this is a green roof. It has many economic and environmental benefits. Green roofs prolong the life of the average roof and help to reduce heating and cooling costs by insulating the building and shading it from the sun’s rays. I would use moss to cover the roof, because they have no roots they will not damage the roof. Mosses are also extremely talented in filtering water runoff. We can get a grant from the USDA to cover up to 75% of our project cost and we would receive a federal tax refund of $1.80/sq foot. Students can be given service learning hours for putting the roof in place and the roof requires little to no maintenance except for occasional waterings. 11. Benjamin Price: Attracting Local Birds In 2013, Ms. Goetz’s Ag class began the Kent County High School Tree-mendous Project. In Spring 2014, Fall 2014, and Spring 2015, the project hosts a day dedicated to planting trees and flowers around Kent County High School and Worton Park. So far volunteers have planted over 2,000 trees. Eventually the project is going to create 10.1 acres of wildlife meadows and flower beds. My responsibility for the Tree-Mendous Project is to research how to attract native birds to the meadows. My main goal is to buy bird homes that provide the best habitat for beneficial birds in order to help education and save threatened birds. Having local birds will help the gardens because the birds would spread seeds and eat harmful insects. I want to invest in birdhouses, bird feeders, poles and cameras for the project. I plan on putting cameras inside the homes, and projecting the live cams for students to watch in school or online. The total cost of my project would be $2,200, and it can be funded by grants such as Choptank electric and EE. Many birds are being threatened from habitat loss and species introduction.The gardens that are being planted provide a perfect environment for local birds, so lets give them a place to stay. 12. B. K. Saunders: Rain Barrels Overall rain barrels are just an easy, fun, and environmentally beneficial project. They will cost us nearly nothing to make, under $35, since we can build most of it out of recycled materials. They are something we could easily do during 3rd period Seminar class and we can also work with the carpentry classes, and art classes and make it a project that involves many students working together. Rain barrels are beneficial for the environment because they will reduce the amount of stormwater runoff caused by the impervious surfaces around our school such as the parking lots. By reducing runoff we will improve the conditions of the soil around our county and also reduce erosion that would be caused as a result of the runoff. The concept of rain barrels is very broad, we can make small rain barrels and use the water to water the plants in the greenhouse and have it as a cheap, fun, project that also helps to make our school “green”, or we can look at the other end of the spectrum and install huge water collecting systems that connect to greywater recycling systems that use the rainwater to flush toilets in the school. Rain barrels can be really simple and cheap, or they can be very expensive and complex. The main idea though is that they are something we should definitely look into and start working on building them to use in our school. 13. Mei-An Blatchford: Bottle Refill Station Water bottles is one of the least recycled materials. Only 13% of used bottles get recycled instead of trying to recycle more, we should reduce our water bottle waste. I believe that we can accomplish this by installing an Elkay Bottle Refill Station. Schools that have installed machines like these, have saved over 1,000 bottles with each machine. These are more efficient and sanitary than regular fountains. The station is able to refill a bottle in seconds using a motion sensor that can doesn’t involve touching it. Each station is $374 and we can get a grant from Keep Maryland Beautiful campaign which gives out grants to environmental projects. 14. Ryan Santmyer: Plastic Lunch Trays Over the last month our STEM Freshman Seminar class has been working on a project in an effort to make our school system more eco-friendly. My idea was to change our lunch trays from styrofoam to reusable plastic trays. Throughout the duration of this project, not only did I find reusable plastic trays would be environmentally better but also economically better for our school system. If we were to change lunch trays through the whole school system, it would save 149,189.04ft3 of trash per school year and $2,351 in one school year. The plastic trays are also better than the styrofoam trays in volume and strength. The plastic trays are over 18 times stronger than the current trays and have over 2 times more food space. Overall, the plastic trays are better than our current trays in usefulness, environmental and monetary ways. 15. Levi Skinner: Levi Skinner, S.L.O.P. bucket Implementing a S.L.O.P. bucket in kent county is very important in making KCHS a green school. S.L.O.P. stands for stuff left on plate. This is great since all the unwanted and uneaten food goes into the S.L.O.P. so our school wastes less food. I have spoke with a pig farmer in Kennedyville and according to him they spend $5-6 a week in pig feed for each pig. The S.L.O.P. can then be sold each week to this pig farmer for about $20 a week and feed all the pigs on this pig farm. This is very beneficial to both the pig farmers since they save money in feeding their pigs and we make money by selling the S.L.O.P. Overall, the S.L.O.P. will be a huge benefit to our school and pig farmers. 16. Sarah Collins: Composting Food Waste Composting is a valuable tool to teach students at KCHS. Its one of the most quick, easy, and cost effective actions we can take to become a green school. In a survey nearly 45% of all school’s waste is compostable. All that food has to go somewhere and usually ends up in a landfill, taking years to decompose. Organic materials break down much faster when composted than they do in landfills, which lack sufficient oxygen for proper decomposition. Garden compost is nutrient-rich natural soil amendment eliminating the need for fertilizer and would be great for all the new plants the Ag program is planting in the spring. For my green school experiment, I asked Mr.Keller to keep a compost bucket in his room for one week. At the end of each day, I weighed the bucket and recorded the data. After the week was over, the total came out to 17.3 pounds of compostable food wasted. My plan is to one day have four compost bins attached to the trash cans in the cafeteria, along with Levi’s S.L.O.P buckets. At the end of second lunch everyday, we would empty the buckets into an actually compost bin. I would also like to have signup sheets for students who might want to volunteer their time, helping with composting. They would also be able to earn community service hours while doing it (Mrs. Phillips approved). The construction crew has offered to build the compost bins for the school. As long as I supply the recycled wood pallets. This would mean no-cost for building the bins. Composting is a great opportunity for our school to take part in. The future is what we make of it, just by taking this little step we would set a solid foundation in our role to the environment and our school in achieving the “Green School” title. 17. Ethan Miller: Dual Flush Toilet System Converter For my green school project, I found how much water our bathrooms use per 3rd period in a week. I found that the school spends a lot of money on water and we can easily change how much water we use in the bathrooms by installing a Dual Flush Toilet System Converter. It is cheap, easy to install, and saves 45% of the normal water usage. The toilet flush system cost around $36, but I have found that Maryland has several agencies that are available for water conservation funding. The agencies give grants, loans or direct payments to non-profit programs such as schools. Some examples are Maryland Dept. of the Environment, Orchard Foundation, and Keep Maryland Beautiful. This system is a good way to help the environment and help the school because it saves the school money and is saving water to help the environment. |
Student designed websites...Freshmen are Green Right Away!!As freshmen coming into high school the school makes kids do a project that involves going to Turners Creek and planting trees every year. Now students have been going back and checking on the trees that have been planted by former freshmen in the past. They were checking the size, the year, and whether or not the tree was actually alive. We are keeping up with the trees we planted as freshmen!
Above are examples of what the students collected as far as data goes about the trees.Pictures showing the students studying the trees planted at the Sassafras River Center. Fall 2014-2016
English isn't all about writing - sometimes it's about reading too! Under a shady tree? A book and ME!
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