The “Green” Vale School.
Green Vale takes seriously a self-imposed commitment to promoting sustainability in the world and within the School community. This is achieved through 1) educational programs built into our academic curriculum; 2) behavioral and structural programs deployed throughout our campus, and 3) supporting our own and others’ special events. A passionate collective of faculty members and student leaders stewards, polices, and celebrates large initiatives and small gestures, wherever undertaken.
Educational Programs
- Earth Day (all-school, full-day curriculum of hands-on environmental learning and service)
- Student Sustainability Club
- Nature-based field trips
- Campus tree-tagging initiative (counting, identifying species and labeling)
- Milkweed planting to attract butterflies for Pre-K chrysalis study
- Effort to quantify Green Vale’s carbon footprint
- Periodic meatless lunches
Behavioral & Structural Initiatives
- The entire campus was converted from fuel oil to natural gas heating
- Active compost pile maintained by kitchen using all eligible scraps and student apple core disposal
- Project Turn Out the Lights (if leaving a room for 10+ minutes)
- New energy efficient windows in Lower School building
- 5th Grade “Recycling Rangers”
- Restoring the campus apple orchard to historic abundance and vitality
- All community members expected to pick up litter whenever possible
- “No Idling” policy for buses and pick-up line cars
- Unplug chargers, shut down computers
- Implementing a virtual server infrastructure, reducing the number of servers on campus from 12 to 4.
- Interior lighting has all transitioned to compact fluorescent bulbs or high-efficiency fluorescent tubes. Program to convert all bulbs to LED’s is underway.
- Cardboard-only recycling dumpster
- Selection of a carting contractor that sorts and recycles all trash
- Most of the campus is controlled by an automated Building Management System (BMS)
Supporting Wider Events
- Earth Hour participation