Sustaining Learning in Green Schools

The Los Angeles Unified School District will spend more than $6 billion over the next decade to build 150 new schools, 5 of which have already been completed. That's quite a change after decades of overcrowded classrooms and temporary trailers. What's more, environmentally sound design principles and materials are being utilized. "We're in an enormous building period that probably won't repeat itself for another 70 years, and this offers us a unique opportunity to build sustainably," says Angelo J. Bellomo, director of Environmental Health & Safety for the District, noting that the new schools will, among other things, conserve energy, use less water in cafeteria food preparation and dishwashing, install low-flow toilets and have proper ventilation to ensure healthy indoor air quality.

Bellomo is cautious about using the word "green," because, he says, preserving natural resources is only part of the goal. The driving factors behind the changes are health, safety and student performance. Poor indoor air quality—due to dust, mold and chemical fumes—is associated with allergies, skin and respiratory irritations and asthma, the leading long-term health cause of school absenteeism. Some chemicals that evaporate from conventional particleboard, plywood, synthetic flooring, carpets, paints and other building products are toxic to nervous systems. And several studies show that students learn better and are healthier when they are in classrooms that are lit by sunlight or full-spectrum lighting. Students in well-ventilated, daylit classrooms are happier, have higher attendance rates and perform better on tests. "When you put it in terms of health and academic performance, people listen," Bellomo says. "Making that connection has allowed us to get this project going, and it is that same connection that will make it happen in other school districts."

Nationwide, from Maryland to Hawaii, "there is certainly a trend toward building greener, healthier schools," says Claire Barnett, executive director of Healthy Schools Network, Inc., a non-profit organization.

Barnett says that in the past two or three years alone she has seen a number of new initiatives for school facilities that will improve children's health, enhance their learning and leave a lighter footprint on the environment. The timing is perfect, given that an estimated 6,000 new, if not necessarily sustainable, schools are scheduled to be built by 2007, according to The Sustainable Buildings Industry Council. There's even been a new term coined to describe them—"high performance schools"—because of their health and productivity, cost effectiveness and sustainability.

Many credit the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC) voluntary Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) program, which certifies buildings that meet its sustainability and performance standards, for getting the word out. For instance, Governor Jim McGreevey of New Jersey wants the state's new or substantially renovated 400-plus schools to incorporate LEED guidelines, although they won't be required to become LEED certified. The trick has been in trying to incorporate LEED principles, originally conceived for commercial buildings, into designs for schools, according to Deane M. Evans, executive director of the Center for Architecture and Building Science Research at the New Jersey Institute of Technology. "LEED is a rating system, not a design tool. It doesn't guarantee good architecture; it's only part of the process," Evans says.

In Honolulu, Hawaii, planners at Punahou, a private K-12 school, say they've been happy—if sometimes challenged—in following a LEED checklist as they designed and built a new, green, $62 million middle-school complex, which opened in late August. According to Dr. Jim Scott, Punahou's president, fulfilling, where possible, the LEED criteria will save considerable money over the school's lifespan because of reduced water and electricity bills. Rainwater will be caught to flush toilets and water plants. As in most high-performance schools, daylit classrooms are a major feature that will ultimately save the school money in lighting classrooms.

Healthy materials include low-VOC paints—the solvents in regular paints can include benzene, formaldehyde, toluene and xylene, which can provoke asthma and are known carcinogens or neurotoxic substances. Windows that open and plentiful circulation of clean air also help protect indoor air quality, as well as reduce doctor's bills and absenteeism. Ecologically sustainable woods, wallboard, flooring (recycled rubber) and student lockers (made of recycled milk cartons) were used. "Because Hawaii is an island state where resources are so limited, and 99 percent of our energy is imported, we're particularly excited about using Case Green Middle School features, such as our photovoltaic-fueled Learning Center, as a community teaching tool for conservation," Dr. Scott says. As of this writing, Punahou was poised to win a LEED gold medal from USGBC.

Some schools, such as the Friends School in Baltimore and the Lick-Wilmerding High School in San Francisco, are building sustainably without going to the expense of seeking LEED certification. Because vinyl flooring, traditional in schools due to its low cost, can offgas phthalates (toxic plasticizing chemicals), in public spaces the Friends School is using concrete polished with Retroplate, a crystalline sealant, which requires only wet mopping or vacuuming to maintain. If their budget allows, they'll put recycled rubber tiles in classrooms for about $27,000—a cost that would be offset in three years when compared with the high costs of maintaining cheaper vinyl floors, architect Darragh Brady says. The roofs of the new buildings will be of recycled rubber tiles that match the school's existing slate roofs. Energy—and money —will be conserved by a geothermal heating and cooling system. Friends expects to make up for the $200,000 it spent on drilling wells in less than five to seven years. Appropriately for a green school, these features will be a part of the curriculum. "The environmental sciences teacher will study geothermal processes. The buildings themselves will also be tools to be learned from," says Katie Hearn, chair of the Friends board of trustees.

Lick-Wilmerding has used its green building project in its curriculum from the project's very beginning. The students started a recycling program as well as composting cafeteria food—the first such effort in a San Francisco high school, which has received an award for excellence in environmental education and conservation from San Francisco's Environment Department. A photovoltaic system generates enough power to run 85 computers, and the physics classes use voltage readouts from the solar panels. Lick-Wilmerding is trying to add a windmill that will generate electricity and also provide a strong symbolic message. Says head of school Al Adams, Ed.D., "It's really a philosophical commitment to take care of the environment and to model it for our students so that it is not something we just teach intellectually in the classrooms but something they actually live every day."

Punahou is also integrating its buildings' environmental concept, design and materials into its curriculum, putting forth challenges to today's students—such as finding ways to fulfill the governor's call to have 20 percent renewable energy in Hawaii by 2020—for environmental problem solving in the future. "We want kids to know they have the capacity to improve the world. The middle school will provide an environment where that can be hatched," Dr. Scott says.

Lori Bongiorno is a contributing writer for The Green Guide and lives in Brooklyn, New York.