Green Urbanism
Green Schools
A green school, also known as a high performance school, is a community facility that is designed, built, renovated, operated, or reused in an ecological and resource-efficient manner. Green schools protect occupant health, provide a productive learning environment, connect students to the natural world, increase average daily attendance, reduce operating costs, improve teacher satisfaction and retention, and reduce overall impact to the environment.
Green schools lessen the impact of building construction on the environment and set an example for future generations that environmental quality is essential to our long-term well being. They also have benefits in several key performance areas:
- Protect Student and Teacher Health - Schools designed with attention to proper ventilation, material selection, acoustical quality and other indoor environmental factors, can expect improved student and teacher health and higher attendance;
- Better Student Performance - Attention to site planning and adequate daylighting has been shown to heighten student performance by as much as 25%;
- Lower Operating Costs - Operating costs for energy and water can be reduced by 20% to 40%, allowing more money to be used for teacher salaries, textbooks and computers;
- Provide a Unique Educational Opportunity - When advanced technology and design in new schools are made visible, buildings can become teaching tools and important features of science, math, and environmental curriculum.
Get involved! To download a letter to send to school officials urging them to make your school a green school, click here.
Sign our letter to President Obama urging him to make green schools a priority.
Learn how you can help green your local school, as well as a list of green school benefits.
For more information on the Green Schools Initiative, contact Ted Bardacke.
In 2004, Global Green launched a new effort focused on K-12 schools in Southern California. This effort integrates the green building principles developed by Collaborative for High Performance Schools (CHPS) with broader neighborhood and regional issues including energy generation, stormwater management, joint-use of school facilities, and the growing movement to use school buildings as teaching tools. Although CHPS is relatively new, it is crucial that a number of districts including Los Angeles, Burbank, Santa Ana, and San Diego have adopted policies requiring CHPS for all future projects. Global Green is working to ensure that these policies are fully implemented and that other districts are aware of the benefits that CHPS and green schools provide. Thus the goals of the Initiative are to:
- Ensure complete implementation of the existing LAUSD green schools policy
- Encourage other Southern California school districts to adopt green school policies
- Develop state legislation to ensure that all new and modernized schools are built to CHPS minimum design standards
- Create additional showcase schools that incorporate cutting-edge practices to educate, inform, and inspire LAUSD and other school districts
- Create a coalition to provide a Southern California base of support for statewide green schools policies and initiatives
In 2004, Global Green launched a new effort, The Green Schools Initiative, focused on greening K-12 schools. When Global Green expanded its effort in New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, schools became a critical component of its rebuilding efforts there. The goal of this initiative is to create healthier classrooms and more energy efficient schools that in turn improve student performance and save money for school districts, while helping to protect the environment and reducing carbon emissions. The Green Schools Initiative has been made possible by a grant from the Bush Clinton Katrina Fund.
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Publications
Green Urbanism Program Case Study: Los Vecinos
Los Vecinos is a 42-unit affordable housing project that meets nearly all of its annual electricity demand through 93 kW of on-site solar photovoltaic power. Located along a light rail line in the southern part of the San Diego metropolitan area, this LEED Platinum certified project is the second Zero Energy Affordable Housing project in the State of California. The project, located on the site of a former dilapidated motel that had the largest number of police calls for any single address in Chula Vista, is a testament to what can be accomplished by a determined development and design team that stands by its commitment to extremely high performance standards. Released March, 2010.
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Green Building Criteria in State Low Income Housing Tax Credit Programs, 2009 Update
Global Green's review of the low-income housing tax credit allocation policy shows significant progress being made in the effort to make green building measures standard practice in affordable housing. This development is particularly apparent through a summary of the changes over the last five years to the green building criteria found in state Qualified Allocation Plans (QAPs), which states develop to guide the distribution of federal Low-Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC). For the first time since we started the analysis in 2005, all 50 states were shown to exhibit some aspects of green building in their QAPs. To learn more, download our 2009 report here.
Here are links to Global Green USA’s QAP reports for the previous four years:
Click here for 2008
Click here for 2007
Click here for 2006
Click here for 2005
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