Greenbuild: The New Three R's for Schools:

Retrofit, Renew, Recycle

November 2010 - The topic of sustainable schools was prevalent throughout the convention, from products geared specifically to educational facilities to sessions exploring the complexities of financing and building green schools. As state Rep. Karen May (D-Highland Park), USGBC Leadership in the Public Sector award winner, said in the closing plenary awards ceremony, “Healthy, high-performance schools mean healthy, high-performance kids.”

Greenguard hosted a panel discussion about green schools at their colorful exhibition booth on Wednesday with moderator Holley Henderson from H2 Ecodesign, and panelists Henning Bloech of Greenguard, Jennifer Seydel of the Green Charter Schools Network, and Rachel Gutter, director of the new Center for Green Schools at USGBC. Of the 133,000 K-12 schools in the U.S., at least 15,000 have air that the EPA qualifies as “unfit to breathe,” according to a recent report (see Robert Redford Teams Up With USGBC for Green Schools Summit). It’s clear that these three organizations are passionate about building healthier schools and achieving an ambitious goal that “everyone will attend a green school within this generation.” {read rest}