Solid Waste Reduction
4th and 5th Grade Students traveled to Annapolis to urge Legislature to support the bill to Ban Styrofoam in Maryland Spring 2016
Students collected lunch trays from their lunch period, washed them and created a 2 styrofoam monsters to take to Annapolis. Students had a tour of the House of Delegates, interacted with Delegate Brooke Leirman and Antonio Hayes in the Appropriations Committee room. They also met Delegate Keith Haynes and Senator Shirley Nathan-Pulliam in the State house. Students were able to discuss why they think its important to ban styrofoam. They discussed the carcinogens that can leach from styrofoam into your food and into ground water, toxic emissions when burned in incinerators, poisons marine life, and supports fossil fuel industry. |
Green club mails letters to our government officials to urge them to support the bill to ban styrofoam in Maryland. Delegate Brooke Leirman actually sent one of our students a response! Her letter stated that she couldn't agree more with our desire to ban styrofoam in Maryland and their office is doing everything they can to get this bill passed. Winter 2016
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Our 4th and 5th Grade Students attended the Styrofoam Youth Advocacy Meeting Winter 2016
After the meeting we made signs to hang up in our school. Students wrote letters that we sent to Councilman Eric Costello, Our neighborhood association Green Committee. Mayor Catherine Pugh, Delegate Brooke Lierman and Senator Bill Ferguson. We traveled to Annapolis February 8th to lobby against Styrofoam. |
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Compost program 2012-Present
Collection of food waste to be composted at lunchtime
FHPS has been collecting our food waste in the cafeteria during lunch. The students were discussed the importance of keeping food waste out of the landfill. They decided they can make a difference by sorting their leftover lunches into a compost bin, recycling and trash. The green team made signs to help everyone understand which bin to place each piece of their leftover lunch. Waste Neutral picks up our food waste each week. In April, we celebrate Earth Day by planting herbs with the soil that was made form composting our food scraps. In one school year FHPS has diverted 15,564 pounds of compostable material from the landfill!!
FHPS has been collecting our food waste in the cafeteria during lunch. The students were discussed the importance of keeping food waste out of the landfill. They decided they can make a difference by sorting their leftover lunches into a compost bin, recycling and trash. The green team made signs to help everyone understand which bin to place each piece of their leftover lunch. Waste Neutral picks up our food waste each week. In April, we celebrate Earth Day by planting herbs with the soil that was made form composting our food scraps. In one school year FHPS has diverted 15,564 pounds of compostable material from the landfill!!
Students repurposed used materials in Art Classes
Recycling Team Every Thursday
5th Grade is our recycling team. Every Wednesday they are responsible to collect the recycle bins from each classroom and office and take them to the loading dock for pick up. They are also responsible for putting them back where they belong the next day.
Recycling Fundraiser
We collect ink cartridges, cell phones, laptops, and old jewlery to be recycles through EcoPhones Recycling Fundraisers.
Collect Cafeteria Reusables Every day
At lunchtime, we have a food-swap table which encourages the students not to throw away their unwanted lunch items. Students collect their milk, snacks, and fruit. Whatever is left over from lunch gets taken into the Pre-K/Kindergarten room for their next day snack time.
Collect Reusable Clothing Every Fall
We have a collection bin in our lobby where students and staff can bring their unwanted clothing items and school uniforms. These items are given to the needy families at our school at the principles discretion.
Water Conservation/ Water Pollution Prevention
FHPS Green Club picks up trash monthy since 2014
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Dog Poop prevention Project Fall and Spring 2015/2016
Green Club makes signs to instruct the community to pick up after the pets. We even made dog bag holders from recycled water bottles to help our community in this effort..
Install Rain Garden "The Rain Keeper" Spring 2015
5th Grade students along with Constellation Energy Volunteers install a Rain Garden at Federal Hill Spring 2015
With funds awarded from the Green, Healthy, Smart, Challenge and Chesapeake Bay Trust grants 5th grade students were able to transform a dilapidated mud pit around a storm drain into a beautiful rain garden that helps to filter trash and debris from our gutter. Our 5th graders designed and built the rain garden. Our project enhanced the habitat of native butterflies and amphibians and created an outdoor classroom space for teachers and students. We met with landscape architect, Zoe Clarkwest at Rain Underground, for guidance. They explained what a rain garden is and how it can help our watershed. The students measured the area, took infiltration tests, and picked out what plants will work best for our soil and light type. This process will take several months because we will only be meeting twice a month. The garden was installed over the course of a week with students and help from our Constellation Energy volunteers and staff. Our build week will took place the first week in April during National Volunteer Week. After the installation of "The Rain Keeper Garden" in April, we hosted a Celebration of Learning Day at the School to have a Grand Opening of our rain garden. The students shared with our community the benefits of our garden and what they can do at home and in their everyday lives to prevent pollutants from entering the our waterways.
With funds awarded from the Green, Healthy, Smart, Challenge and Chesapeake Bay Trust grants 5th grade students were able to transform a dilapidated mud pit around a storm drain into a beautiful rain garden that helps to filter trash and debris from our gutter. Our 5th graders designed and built the rain garden. Our project enhanced the habitat of native butterflies and amphibians and created an outdoor classroom space for teachers and students. We met with landscape architect, Zoe Clarkwest at Rain Underground, for guidance. They explained what a rain garden is and how it can help our watershed. The students measured the area, took infiltration tests, and picked out what plants will work best for our soil and light type. This process will take several months because we will only be meeting twice a month. The garden was installed over the course of a week with students and help from our Constellation Energy volunteers and staff. Our build week will took place the first week in April during National Volunteer Week. After the installation of "The Rain Keeper Garden" in April, we hosted a Celebration of Learning Day at the School to have a Grand Opening of our rain garden. The students shared with our community the benefits of our garden and what they can do at home and in their everyday lives to prevent pollutants from entering the our waterways.
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Paint Storm Drains in our Surrounding Community 4/2016Walter Saxon from the Federal Hill Neighborhood association will be coming to our school April 25th to celebrate Earth Day. One of the many activities they will be helping us with is painting storm drains in the neighborhood surrounding our school. Students and parents have identified 16 more drains in our community that need to be painted as well as touch up our prior storm drains painted.
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Energy Conservation
Turn Off Lights Stickers 2012- present
Students in the 3rd, 4th and 5th grade green club made stickers with different sayings to turn off the lights. In addition to this Baltimore energy challenge brought stickers to place on all of the light switches. They walked around the whole school and either put energy challenge stickers or handmade notices on the lights. Each year we replace any of the stickers that are damaged or have fallen off.
Baltimore Energy Challenge Grant Recipient Spring 2016
- Pssst…Spread the Word!
- With our grant funds students wanted to increase awareness in our school community by designing an energy saving logo. Keep Calm and Turn off the Lights. We printed T-shirts with this logo that the entire student population will be presented with at our celebration of learning. The students will be able to wear these T-shirts in school every Wednesday to remind them to save energy.
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Baltimore Energy Challenge Grant 2014/2015
Energy Patrol. These students spoke to their peers at an assembly about how we can save energy in our classrooms and at home. With the help of our AmeriCorps educators, this team completed an audit of the school and compiled the results on a graph that is displayed in the cafeteria. This way each class can see how much energy they are using in comparison to their peers and can adjust accordingly. Students made signs to promote energy savings for the school. We had power down Wednesdays, where teachers would use desk lamps instead of overhead lights. This turned into powerdown everyday! Once the teachers realized they didn’t need all of the lights they were just went without. They had enough light from the outside to do this. We hosted an energy night at the school to present energy saving ideas, energy saver kits and activities to the school and community members. Finally, we were fortunate enough to be part of an Energy competition with 13 other schools. This enabled us to compare our energy bills from the beginning of the school year to the end to see how much of a difference our changes have made. We decreased our energy output by 14% overall. I credit this to the changes we made in how we think about energy use at the school. I credit the change in midset of our students to our wonderful AmeriCorps educators who excited the kids about the methods to saving energy and the impact they can have by making these changes. |
Energy Conservation Pledge Winter 2015
Some of our Thesapian Green Club students share their pledges to conserve energy.
Some of our Thesapian Green Club students share their pledges to conserve energy.
Power Down Competition 2014 and 2015
Federal Hill Preparatory entered into a Power Down Competition Sponsored by Baltimore Energy Challenge. Federal Hill Prep won the competition in 2014 out of 13 schools that participated! We participated in 2015 but did not win the prize. We accomplished this by turning half of the lights off in each room. Our green club did an energy audit with the help of our teach for America volunteers. We read a different announcement each morning on how we can save energy.
Federal Hill Preparatory entered into a Power Down Competition Sponsored by Baltimore Energy Challenge. Federal Hill Prep won the competition in 2014 out of 13 schools that participated! We participated in 2015 but did not win the prize. We accomplished this by turning half of the lights off in each room. Our green club did an energy audit with the help of our teach for America volunteers. We read a different announcement each morning on how we can save energy.
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Green club creates a skit about saving energy with our Baltimore Energy Challenge Americorp Volunteers. We learned about how much energy is used when supermarkets have to ship their goods long distances. Students created a skit about the importance of buying local and finding local farmers markets. Spring 2015
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Baltimore Energy Challenge Americorps Volunteers teach our students how to save energy by using LED or CFL light bulbs compared to incadescent. Spring 2014
Baltimore Energy Challenge Americorps Volunteers work with our students perform and energy audit in the classrooms. Students went around to each classroom and looked at the devices that were plugged in. They measured how much electricity each appliance was drawing when it was turned on and off. Spring 2014
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Habitat Restoration
FHPS " Home of the Birds" Bird Sanctuary Spring 2016
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FHPS Bi-Annual Garden Clean -up. Students and families come out for our bi-annual school garden clean up. Everyone pitches in to weed, spread mulch, sweep and pick up litter. Spring 2016
Structures for Environmental Learning
Coming Spring 2017 FHPS Sustainabilty Campaign " Get the Word Out" Mural
With our 2017 Green, Healthy, Smart, Challenge grant award, we will be creating a 1600 sqft mural that will be completed in April 2017 during National Volunteer Week. We will be painting a mural similar to the picture below on our black top as well as creating a nature walk connecting our three outdoor learning centers. We will be constructing a sculpture (similar to the picture below) along our school yard fence using recycled plastic bags and other recycled material.
With our 2017 Green, Healthy, Smart, Challenge grant award, we will be creating a 1600 sqft mural that will be completed in April 2017 during National Volunteer Week. We will be painting a mural similar to the picture below on our black top as well as creating a nature walk connecting our three outdoor learning centers. We will be constructing a sculpture (similar to the picture below) along our school yard fence using recycled plastic bags and other recycled material.
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Movable outdoor classrooms. 2014- Present
9/16/15
Third grade embarked on another nature walk around Federal Hill Park today. We noted the things we saw, how to describe them, and spent time seeing how the city environment interacts with nature.
Third grade embarked on another nature walk around Federal Hill Park today. We noted the things we saw, how to describe them, and spent time seeing how the city environment interacts with nature.
Students started preparation for the spring garden planting Winter 2017. Students started by reading "Seed, Soil, Sun" . We then planted a garden in a glove. We mapped out in our notebooks a hand. Planted a wet cotton ball in each finger with seeds for radishes, lettuce, peas, pumpkin, and carrots. We tapped our gloves to the window to get a greenhouse effect. After 2 weeks we observed sprouting and transplanted our seedlings to a cardboard egg carton. We took soil samples from our raised beds which Ms. Wolpert will take back to her laboratory to have tested. We started our growth charts in our notebooks. Next we will talk about plants and their space. We are going to learn more about the seeds we planted and create a recipe book featuring each vegetable. Students will plan the garden using square foot garden method and prepare the garden for planting. We will transplant our indoor garden outside a keep it under observation for maintenance. When ready we will harvest the vegetables and do a tasting.
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Students visit our school garden in preparation for planting season. We make notes in our notebook about the condition of the soil and what we will plant for the Spring season in our 15 raised beds. Our University of Maryland Medical Student volunteers have been volunteering with our green club this school year and are giving their recommendations as well. Spring 2016
Responsible Transportation
Walking field trips.
Federal Hill Preparatory School is fortunate enough to be located in the middle of a bustling city. We are able to walk to parks, the Inner Harbor, the Science Center, the Enoch Pratt Library , and the Aquarium. This saves us money on buses and saves the environment on caustic fumes from the buses that we don't have to take.
National Bike and Walk to School Day (Annually in May)
This event encourages students to bike or walk while teaching them about the health and environmental benefits of biking and walking. It also helps raise community awareness about the importance of bicycle and pedestrian safety education, safe routes to school, well-maintained walkways, and traffic calming in neighborhoods around schools. At Federal Hill our students are able to do this everyday weather permitting. Everyday 2010 to present.
Healthy School Environment
FSNE Nutrition Educator Amy Wolpert visits all grades monthly throughout the school year to teach nutrition education lessons and provide healthy food tastings.
Pre K through 3rd grade, pictured above
Fall 2016, FSNE program, Read for Health lesson, “Grocery Shopping and Cooking Together”
Students learned how much fun it is to spend time together as a family by discussing ways to help select healthy foods at the grocery store and assist with meal preparation. Students worked together to prepare their own fun, colorful and healthy snack, while practicing various food preparation skills. Each class prepared the ingredients for the recipe “Fruit Kebobs” and worked as a team to assemble the snacks for tasting. Yum!
Spring 2016, FSNE program, Read For Health lesson, “Where Do Fruits and Vegetables Grow?”
Students learned where fruits and vegetables come from and how they grow in the garden. Each class practiced food preparation skills by creating a healthy salad together with the vegetables discussed during the lesson. The seeds of the vegetables used in the salad where then planted first in a glove, then in a cup for students to observe, care for, and watch grow.
Fall 2015, FSNE program, Read For Health lesson, “Fruits and Vegetables”
Students learned to identify fruits and vegetables, discovered that fruits and vegetables grow on a farm, and tasted fresh fruits and vegetables from a local farmer’s market. The students had the opportunity to taste several varieties of locally grown produce including apples, cauliflower, and pears, then voted for their favorite.
Pre K through 3rd grade, pictured above
Fall 2016, FSNE program, Read for Health lesson, “Grocery Shopping and Cooking Together”
Students learned how much fun it is to spend time together as a family by discussing ways to help select healthy foods at the grocery store and assist with meal preparation. Students worked together to prepare their own fun, colorful and healthy snack, while practicing various food preparation skills. Each class prepared the ingredients for the recipe “Fruit Kebobs” and worked as a team to assemble the snacks for tasting. Yum!
Spring 2016, FSNE program, Read For Health lesson, “Where Do Fruits and Vegetables Grow?”
Students learned where fruits and vegetables come from and how they grow in the garden. Each class practiced food preparation skills by creating a healthy salad together with the vegetables discussed during the lesson. The seeds of the vegetables used in the salad where then planted first in a glove, then in a cup for students to observe, care for, and watch grow.
Fall 2015, FSNE program, Read For Health lesson, “Fruits and Vegetables”
Students learned to identify fruits and vegetables, discovered that fruits and vegetables grow on a farm, and tasted fresh fruits and vegetables from a local farmer’s market. The students had the opportunity to taste several varieties of locally grown produce including apples, cauliflower, and pears, then voted for their favorite.
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With our Green, Healthy, Smart Challenge Grant Award in the Spring of 2014 Our students installed a Living Wall to help filter the air we breath.
In teaching our students to live a more sustainable lifestyle, we want to improve indoor air quality in our school. Asthma is a major problem in big cities with low income families. Poor indoor air quality can cause asthma attacks in persons with asthma and increased absenteeism among both students and staff. According to the EPA, indoor air pollutants can be two to five times higher than outdoor air pollutants, making indoor air one of the top five environmental health risks. We wanted to build a living wall at FHPS to improve our indoor air quality. Everyday our living wall will remind us about our commitment to a healthier life for school and our community. Since the 5th grade class would be responsible for the construction and maintenance of the wall, we wanted to use something that was easy to maintain. So with a little research we found a product called Florafelt. The felt is made from recycled plastic bottles and a nylon non-toxic plastic fiber. The roots grow into the Florafelt as the plants grow. The 5th grade students helped select which plants we were going to use based on a study we read about published by NASA. Students researched what kind of plants filter certain chemicals out of the air. Students chose plants that filtered the most chemicals from the air. We discussed how plants convert CO2 into oxygen and how some plants even absorb toxic VOCs (volatile organic compounds), which have been shown to exasperate asthma symptoms. These VOCs are emitted by many different household products craft materials, cleaning products, copier inks, furnishings, and many others. These products can release organic compounds while you are using them, and to some degree while they are being stored. The students also needed to find plants that would grow well indoors. They narrowed it down to 11 different varieties. With a donation from Wheelabrator and a Sustainability Grant, from the Office of Sustainability, we were able to install our living wall. We were able to get the plants we needed from GreenFields Nursery at a discount. We enlisted the help of Baltimore City Master Gardener, Jenny Kaurinki to assist us with the actual planting of this project and Yindra Cottman-Dixon, a parent volunteer at FHPS. D'Ann Williams, DrPH, MS, Research Associate at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health Department of Environmental Health Sciences Environmental Health Engineering came to our school to take measurements with our students of the particles in our air in rooms with and without indoor plants. The students were able to see a correlation in rooms with plants had less particles than rooms without.Not only does our living wall look fantastic but it is cleaning our air. The next step would be to see if our students with asthma miss less school because of it! |
Dry Erase-Boards in all classrooms
FHPS usues dry-erase boards in their classrooms to eliminate chalk dust, a common asthma trigger.
Federal Hill Prep installs fruit trees! Spring 2014
FHPS has its own master gardener. Along with some parent members of Community Greening Resource Network (CGRN) our master gardener received fruit trees during the Spring give away day. They brought back a fig, an apricot, 2 apple and 2 pear trees for planting. Green club dug holes and planted them.
Marathon Kids Every year our students sign up in the Fall and committ to running 26.2 miles over the course of several months in their physical education class. PTO hosts a Marathon Kids Rally celebrating the halfway mark! Fresh Fruit is given out to all of the students. Congratulations to all our healthy students who made it to 13.1 mile mark! See you at the finish line!