About the School of Environmental Studies

The School of Environmental Studies

Compiled and written by student, Katie Paulson-Smith

The School of Environmental Studies (SES) is high school that was founded to create environmentally-literate citizens active in the global community. Its vision is to be a community of leaders learning to enhance the relationships between people and their environments. SES has been publicly recognized for its originality and accomplishments by numerous agencies and organizations since it opened in 1995.

• Curriculum: SES is known for its innovative, interdisciplinary, and experiential curriculum. At SES, we learn the complexities of all that the environmental studies encompasses, including culture, science, politics, economics, technology, and ethics. Every day we have a Thematic Studies class that combines English, science, and social studies, which are connected by overarching themes, such as biodiversity, the environmental impacts of human actions, and sustainability. As students work to gain understanding of the themes, we complete hands-on projects and assignments that lead to relevant, real-world assessment of our progress.

o For instance, my junior year, we did an extensive project called Pond Profile, in which each group analyzed the chemical, biological, and historical aspects of a specific pond by interviewing residents in the area and utilizing technology, such as dissolved oxygen meters, Secchi disks, and seine nets.
o This fall in my senior year, we conducted a buckthorn population-modeling field study for the MN Department of National Resources at Fort Snelling State Park.
o In the spring of senior year, we have a mass transit unit, in which students gain experience using the light rail and buses to learn how to commute with a smaller carbon footprint.

However, students don’t only learn about the environment; students are challenged to figure out how to manage the environment for what they value.

• Past projects: The School of Environmental Studies earned accreditation to send a student-delegation to the U.N. Convention on Climate Change COP-15 in Copenhagen, December 2009 because of the following evidence of its competence for observer status.
Compiled and written by teacher, Craig Johnson

The School of Environmental Studies (SES) is an upper level secondary school. The student body is comprised of 400 17 and 18 years old students (note: the students that take part in the SES observer delegation to the UNFCCC meetings in Copenhagen will all be 18 years of age). The school is founded on an Environmental Studies curricular focus and a philosophical commitment to experiential learning and active citizenship. For the past decade, climate change education and climate change solution advocacy have been hallmarks of the SES curriculum. Climate change represents, from an education perspective, an ideal environmental issue on which to focus because it is by its very nature integrated and systems based. It has been, and continues to be, a major area of study, research, and action at SES, primarily because its study must consider the synergies of culture, environment, science, politics, economics, technology and ethics, and its solutions must be grounded in these synergies as well. It is the belief of the SES community that it is in the examination of and involvement in these complex issues that students gain the necessary knowledge, skills, attitudes, and commitment to become environmentally literate, global citizens and leaders. The UNFCCC meetings in Copenhagen represent the ultimate opportunity for members of an SES delegation to manifest this examination and involvement by participating as observers at the upcoming Convention. It is for this important reason that we seek organization observer status for SES.

Organization (SES) competence in climate change related study, research, and action has evolved significantly over the past 10 years. Modest beginnings involving the study of carbon cycling, climate science, natural and anthropogenic causes, and potential solutions, have become the foundation for the wide range of major climate change related projects and initiatives described below.

1. Wind Turbine and Solar Panel installation and education

In 2006 a small group of SES students began to explore the possibility making the campus and its lands a demonstration site for sustainable renewable energy. The project that evolved, a partnership between SES, Dakota Electric Association, the City of Apple Valley, and the Minnesota Zoo, resulted in the construction of a 20 kW 160 foot high wind turbine and two 1kW solar panel arrays. The installation includes extensive educational displays and signage accessible to the public and a data collection and archive system that allows for real time monitoring of energy outputs as well as on-going student research projects. Students from three graduating classes worked on the SES renewable energy project. The wind turbine and solar panels were completed and went on line in 2008.

http://www.ecowerc.com/projects/applevalley-groundbreak.html

http://www.district196.org/ses/energy/energy_summary2.cfm


2. World Wildlife Fund (WWF) Climate Camp

As the first phase of a project partnership with the World Wildlife Fund, faculty from SES participated in a WWF Climate Camp in Homer, Alaska. The goal of the conference was to provide current information on the environmental and cultural impacts of climate change in the northern and arctic regions. Additionally, conference participants worked in teams to develop action strategies and plans designed to contribute to the mitigation of climate change impacts. SES representatives worked with WWF staff to develop the World Stories Project at SES and the WWF has continued to be a partner in this ongoing project.

http://www.climatecampak.org/


3. Baffin Island Student Cultural Exchange

In 2006 arctic explorer Will Steger began preparations for his Global Warming 101 dogsled expedition on Baffin Island in Nunavut, Canada. The expedition, a joint venture between Steger’s American team and team of Inuit guides and hunters, had the goal of putting a face on climate change by traveling to and visiting Inuit communities on Baffin Island that were being adversely affect by the behavior of people in other countries and cultures. Working with the assistance of and in partnership with the Steger Foundation, SES students, staff, and community members planned and carried out a concurrent student cultural exchange to Baffin Island. Timed to meet up with the Global Warming 101 expedition team, a group of SES students and staff traveled to Clyde River, Nunavut on the first portion of a student cultural exchange with the school there. The goal of the student cultural exchange was also to put a face on climate change, but to do so in a way that connected young people from two cultures around the climate change issue. SES students blogged daily about their experiences (links below). The blogs were read and used by a host of schools following the exchange on-line.

http://baffinexchange.blogspot.com/

http://arcticspeak.blogspot.com/

http://www.globalwarming101.com/


4. Carbon Diet Challenge

In a double-pronged effort to both support the Baffin Island student cultural exchange financially and affect change in personal behaviors related to climate, in 2006 SES designed and implemented a Carbon Diet Challenge program. Students began by establishing their carbon footprint baseline, reflecting their normal carbon emission levels, measured in pounds of CO2 per unit time. The students then got per pound pledges for how much carbon they would be able to lose on their “carbon diet” as a result of their behavioral changes. The money collected from this initiative was used to help fund the Baffin Island student exchange. The website for the SES Carbon Diet Challenge can be viewed by following the link below.

http://www.district196.org/ses/carbon.html


5. Clyde River Student Exchange

The second half of the Baffin Island exchange involved students from Quluaq School in Clyde River Nunavut, Canada traveling to SES and Minnesota. In the fall of 2007, four Inuit students and two adults from Clyde River spent two weeks at SES to complete the exchange. The exchange was a powerful learning experience for all. The Inuit students had few if any experiences in the south, and SES students and the extended community had a tremendous opportunity to learn first hand about a culture they knew very little about.

http://www.cr2ses.blogspot.com/


6. World Stories of Change Project

The Baffin Island student cultural exchange was the kick-off for the multi-year World Stories of Change Project. In partnership with the World Wildlife Fund and the Minnesota Zoo, the goal of the World Stories of Change initiative is to collect first hand, audio stories from indigenous people witnessing climate related change in the places they live. SES students participating in the Baffin Island exchange learned about the Inuit culture and received training in interview techniques and the use of digital recording equipment. While on Baffin Island students interviewed and collected stories of change and, upon returning to SES, edited recordings and supporting photos into audio slide shows in which elements of climate related change are described by the voices of the people living there. A sample of the audio slide shows from Baffin Island can be viewed following the link below. Since the Baffin Island Exchange, the World Stories of Change Project has expanded. SES has an extensive field studies program, with students traveling to various parts of the state, nation, and world. This academic year stories and images were recorded in New Zealand, Australia, South Africa, Alaska, Scotland, and on Mount Kilimanjaro in Tanzania. The program will continue to be integrated into the field studies program, with plans in process to share the final story products with visitors at the Minnesota Zoo.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksbuHaQaOq0


7. Polar Bear Population Modeling Project

For the past ten years Advanced Placement Environmental Science students at SES have worked with scientists with the Conservation Breeding Specialists Group (CBSG), a subgroup of The World Conservation Union (IUCN) housed at the Minnesota Zoo. A primary focus of CBSG’s work is population modeling and management strategies for critically endangered species. Increasingly climate change has become an important consideration in determining the viability of endangered populations. After receiving training and practice with computer based population viability analysis, SES students have worked with CBSG scientists on a variety of endangered species. Most recently, SES students developed a baseline population viability analysis for polar bears in the Western Hudson’s Bay region of Canada, and this coming academic year will work with senior CBSG scientists to integrate climate change variables into the population viability analysis program.

http://www.cbsg.org/cbsg/


8. Schools Cutting Carbon project – School Energy audit

SES has joined other Minnesota Schools in a three-year project to examine school and campus practices to find ways to reduce energy usage and carbon emissions. Students at SES helped conduct an energy audit of the school and are now working on a school wide energy reduction plan. The plan will be completed in the fall and implementation will begin during the 2009 – 2010 academic year.

http://www.schoolscuttingcarbon.org/
http://www.cleanenergyresourceteams.org/schoolscuttingcarbon


9. Green Schools Alliance

The SES community has joined the Green School Alliance (GSA). The GSA is an alliance of K-12 schools, both public and private, who have committed to taking action on climate change, energy, and environmental issues. SES has accepted the GSA Green Schools Climate Commitment, pledging to reduce the school’s carbon footprint by at least 30% within five years and achieve school-wide carbon neutrality by 2020.

http://www.greenschoolsalliance.org/


10. Earth Day Energy Focus / Minnesota Energy Challenge

Since its inception fourteen years ago, SES has had intensive, student driven, school-wide Earth Week programming. In 2007 Climate Change was the primary theme of the events and activities, and the 2009 theme of Energy accommodated a great number of climate change related events once again. The Earth Week programming is often central to initiating and/or significantly supporting major projects, including several, such as the Baffin Island Student Cultural Exchange and the World Stories Project, mentioned here. This past spring the energy theme resulted in over 50% of the student body participating in the Minnesota Energy Challenge, a program that facilitates an individual family audit of energy use (and the corresponding carbon emissions) and a commitment on the part of individuals to reduce energy use and decrease carbon emissions in their own lives by altering their behavior in environmentally positive ways.

http://www.mnenergychallenge.org/challenge/ezform/


11. YEA Minnesota Involvement / Powershift

SES students joined students from schools around the region to create a collective youth voice on climate change and other environmental issues. YEA Minnesota (Youth Environmental Activists) was formed by students in partnership with the Will Steger Foundation and the Alliance for Sustainability to provide a structure in which students from many schools and communities could work together on issues of common concern such as climate change. Further, several SES students attended the national Powershift conference in Washington D.C., with the goal of having youth engage elected officials on climate change and energy issues.


12. SES/Justus Tranchellgymnasiet School exchange

Each senior at SES completes a capstone process, culminating in a senior project that addresses the capstone question, “How then, shall I live?”. Each student is asked to engage in a self-selected and self-directed project that leaves a significant positive impact. In 2009, two students established a school partnership program with a similar school in Landskrona, Sweden. After a preliminary trial run in the 2008-2009 academic year, students from the two schools will participate jointly in the Young Masters Programme (YMP) in the fall. YMP is a web-based distance-learning program focused on sustainability issues and, more importantly, projects that reflect proactive strategies to avoid or mitigate negative environmental impacts. The two schools will focus their partnership work on climate change. A student exchange between the two schools is also being planned.

http://www.iiiee-ymp.org/drupal/


13. District Schools for Energy Efficiency (SEE) program

Independent School District 196 and its member schools, including SES, have actively implemented the Schools for Energy Efficiency (SEE) program. At SES, students have assisted in a school-wide energy audit, worked with the district to switch to post-consumer paper products, helped establish new protocols for lights, heating, and cooling, and designed a number of transportation awareness and options initiatives.

http://seeprograms.com/overview.htm
http://seeprograms.com/


14. Climate Change Related Presentations

SES students and faculty have presented on climate change and climate change related programs at a variety of events and conferences, including the Will Steger Education Institute, the Minnesota State Environmental Education Conference, and the Nobel Peace Prize Forum at St. Olaf College.


http://www.globalwarming101.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&id=101&Itemid=46

http://fusion.stolaf.edu/news/index.cfm?fuseaction=NewsDetails&id=4591