California Area School District recognized as top sustainability school
Karen Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
California Area Elementary School students, from left, Austin Ott, Emma Vash, Ryan Neil, and L.J. Pollock, display the solar-powered scooters they drive between the elementary school and the high school as part of the district’s environmental and sustainability initiatives.
Karen Mansfield/Observer-Reporter
Students at California Area School District work at the campus apiary on a recent school day. The apiary, launched this year, provides students the opportunity to learn sustainability through hands-on work tending bees and crafting honey.
Innovative programming helped California Area School District become one of 11 districts nationally – and the only in Pennsylvania – receive recognition for sustainability efforts, the U.S. Department of Education announced Thursday.
The DOE recognized 26 schools, 11 districts and four postsecondary institutions nationwide for efforts to reduce environmental impact and utility costs, improve health and wellness and teach sustainability. CASD was honored as a District Sustainability Awardee for its innovative curriculum.
“We’re so excited. I didn’t expect us to get it. You try, you don’t always know,” said CASD Superintendent Dr. Laura Jacob. “We’re really honored. If we’re going to see change and if we’re going to see action, we have to teach it to our kids, so we have to model that.”
For years, CASD has offered a variety of hands on, theory and practical application environmental curricula. Last year, through grant funding, Jacob brought solar-powered scooters to campus as part of the district’s efficiency efforts.
“The solar-powered scooters had a big impact (on the award). We’re able to reduce emissions by using the solar-powered scooters daily,” she said.
District Sustainability Awardees had to fit several criteria, including health and wellness, a box checked by CASD’s Farm to School and Harvest of the Month programs, the former statewide and the latter, funded by the DOE and Project PA.
“Having fresh foods, having access to fresh foods and local foods, I think is a key point. We’re really trying to teach kids what’s available each season, and then cooking around (that),” Jacob said. “So often we go to the grocery store and get strawberries and avocados, and we forget there are implications for getting seasonal foods (out of season). We have to teach kids that avocados aren’t available, technically, year-round. There’s a reason we celebrate pumpkin in the fall: it’s available then.”
Along with teaching how to plan meals around what is available locally and seasonally, CASD has an aquaponics program that allows students to grow their own food on campus. Students also raise bees and make lip balm and other products at the school apiary, a program launched just this year.
“I’d say that’s the one I’m most proud of having integrated into the school right now,” said Jacob. “I think that probably is the No. 1 area that will have long-lasting implications with the kids. We took something that the kids thought they were scared of, bees. By having the bee club and having the kids in the apiary, they’re understanding, they’re respecting them more and they’re valuing them more. If the kids value the bees, they understand the impact of pesticides and herbicides. I do it all as just incremental change toward better sustainability.”
CASD’s goatscaping – a growing trend in which goats do the majority of a district, borough or town’s landscaping – also contributed to the district’s recognition.
Two-thirds of this year’s district and school honorees are located in low-income communities, where access to sustainability is often lacking. About 48% of CASD students are economically disadvantaged, according to the California Area School District Level Plan 07/01/2023-06/30/2026.
“We’re just really excited,” said Jacob. “We’re going to continue to make incremental changes to make the planet better for everybody and teach by example.”