About 650 students in grades 6-12 competed in the 62nd Annual Central California Regional Science, Mathematics and Engineering Fair on March 16th-19th. Joshuan Donnelly from Buchanan High School won the special recognition from the Central Valley Water Awareness Committee for water related projects with his work on “Aquatic Plants in Wastewater Treatment”. He compared the ability of different common aquatic plants to remove fertilizers from water. His experiment demonstrated that the Egeria Densa plant removed nitrogen the fastest, however, the Java Fern was able to withstand the high ammonia concentrations in the second and third trials of the experiment. USGBC Central California’s Water Conservation Committee had the honor to be part of the Central Valley Water Awareness Committee judging team. Congratulations to all students who participated in this year’s science fair!
What is your idea of a nice landscape? Most gardens and green spaces in Central California still follow the old model of turf grass and high water use plants. Pair this with on old irrigation system that has low-water efficiency and you have high water consumption and high maintenance landscapes.
Did you know that traditional turf maintained by an average, 50% efficient irrigation system needs ten feet of water a year to stay green? A whole lot of valuable water in an area with generally low precipitation rates, which is parched by drought and where the biggest industry is water dependent. Time for a change!
During USGBC-CC’s November workshop “Step-By-Step to Water Wise Landscaping” Brad Greenbury and David Bigelow provided an overview over California appropriate landscaping and efficient irrigation systems. Brad and David are two local experts on water wise gardens with a combined experience of 45 years in converting traditional landscapes to water wise landscapes. Find the ppt of the workshop here and a list of water wise plants here.
California’s water scarcity forces everybody to rethink their water use. USGBC Central California volunteers worked with schools to become part of the solution to address this issue. On September 27th, 30 volunteers came together to perform free water audits at six Central Valley schools as part of the international Green Apple Day of Service event. The volunteers helped the schools get water wise by detecting leaks, providing the schools an overview over the state of their technology, and evaluation existing water awareness campaigns. Local architects, engineers, construction professionals and students of these fields received training from USGBC Central California and the City of Fresno Water Department to perform the water audits.
Sierra Unified is one of the school districts benefiting from the event. The school district is located in the foothills and draws its water from wells. Facilities & Maintenance Supervisor Jim Harris is looking at all options to save water. “We want to make most of the water that we do have”, Jim says. Volunteers looked at sprinkler heads, drinking fountains, faucets and other water outlets. One additional item on the list of the water auditors: signs to encourage water conservation. These belong to the low-cost options to remind everybody to use water wisely.
Green Apple Day of Service is an initiative from the Center for Green Schools at the U.S. Green Building Council that brings together advocates from around the world and encourages them to take action in their communities through service projects at local schools. This is the first time USGBC Central California is participating in this effort to transform all schools into healthy, safe, cost-efficient and productive learning places.
Thank you to all the volunteers who participated and all our partners that supported the event, Platinum Partner TETER AE, Gold Partner City of Fresno, Silver Partners Darden Architects, Sustap, and POM Wonderful.
Sierra Unified is one of the school districts benefitting from the event. The school district is located in the foothills and draws its water from wells. Facilities & Maintenance Supervisor Jim Harris is looking at all options to save water. “We want to make most of the water that we do have”, Jim says. Volunteers looked at sprinkler heads, drinking fountains, faucets and other water outlets. One additional item on the list of the water auditors: signs to encourage water conservation. These belong to the low-cost options to remind everybody to use water wisely.
Check out media coverage of the event:
Fresno Bee
Fresno Business Journal
CBS47
Become a USGBC-CC member and support initiatives like Green Apple Day of Service!
USGBC-CC started 2014 off by partnering up with students from Edison High School’s Green Energy Academy to learn about green buildings. The program, “Measuring Green Buildings”, had Architects, Engineers and Contractors actually go into the classrooms at Edison High School to provide the students with real-world learning experiences. The experts engaged students with such diverse topics as: construction management, commissioning energy systems, acoustical performance, “green” building materials, and architectural design strategies. As part of the program, students had the rare opportunity to actually test the acoustical performance of one of their classrooms. After the experience, one of the Edison students commented, “It was something new and new things are always great. I didn’t really know much about buildings, but after this experience, I now look at buildings with different eyes.”
Green Energy Academy’s Teacher, Taylor Vizthum, expressed his excitement about the students’ keen interest in learning, "In a class of High School Seniors, during the last class of the day you typically expect the students to become ever vigilant "clock monitors", however, during this project, the guest speakers and content was so engaging, they persuaded students to remain after class because they still had questions they wanted answered."
After the educational hands-on learning experience students prepared posters that they presented at the “Green Schools Tour”, which took place at Edison High School’s new award winning building. The tour provided another rare element of learning – networking opportunities. This collaboration with Professionals actually working in the field is crucial for the seniors as they graduate from High School and plan their future.
“Industry partnerships are one of the key elements as we aim to prepare our students for the challenges of the 21st century, and meet the needs for better Science Technology Engineering and Math (STEM) education. Opportunities as such bring context and relevance and help students connect to their learning. We are grateful for having organizations like USGBC in our community, who are willing to help us connect with the industry and help better the educational experience of our students, and inspire them to pursue STEM fields”, reported Ellie Honardoost, Program Manager of the Office of College and Career Readiness at Fresno Unified. Members of the USGBC and general public were invited to attend the event and learn about the High School’s program and building. The event was a great success!
USGBC – Central CA Chapter would like to thank all of the volunteers from Edison High School, Architects, Engineers, and Contractors involved in the project. A special thank you goes out to the Project Leader, Kjirsten Harpain from Darden Architects, who did an awesome job bringing experts together and working with the teacher to design the curriculum!
USGBC-CC is a 501(c)3non-profit organization.
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