Our sustainability education is multifaceted, interdisciplinary, and essential. It enables children to examine and appreciate our world, explore all branches of science, and develop a personal affinity for nature and appreciation of its vast wonders.
INTERCONNECTEDNESS
Our sustainability program helps students to see and understand the connections between human activities and our planetary systems, between people and other species, and in our impact on Earth’s complicated ecosystems.
OPPORTUNITIES FOR LEARNING
We aspire to educate and motivate our students about greener, smarter possibilities that benefit and enhance our own lives and the broader world. Our child-focused science curriculum and interactive ‘green’ building elements motivate students to deeply evaluate, assess and question.
CONNECTING WITH THE NATURAL WORLD
Children actively invest in the natural world around them through our hands-on, multi-sensory, multidisciplinary program. Students explore, evaluate and take ownership of our native garden, p-patches, and stewardship of Thornton Creek.
RESPONSIBILITY AND ACTION
At our core, we want to leave the planet a better place for future generations—to live a life of impact and purpose. When students learn, understand and explore, they are able to flex their critical thinking, tune their negotiating skills, and act.
OPTIMISM
In this era of climate angst, keeping the focus positive is vital for our children. We believe it is essential that students are provided a foundation for hope with optimistic avenues for action. Our sustainability orientation inspires children to ask themselves, “How can we think more deeply, be more aware, and be good to the earth?” Our focus is on the beauty and promise of solutions.
Our School Facilities Illustrate our Focus on Sustainability
THE SEED SCIENCE BUILDING
Underscoring the importance of science and sustainability at Perkins is the SEED Classroom, which is our science building. First revealed at the Living Futures Conference in 2014, the SEED Classroom (Sustainable Education Every Day) is the world’s first modular “living building.” Certified and heralded by the International Living Future Institute (see article), this classroom is a “Net Zero” building.
The SEED Building and its relationship to Perkins science and sustainability programs have drawn local and national attention:
PBS Newshour - Classrooms get Sustainable
National Public Radio - Schools Explore Solutions
The World's Greenest Classroom Might Be in Seattle
UW Education - Introducing Young Learners to Sustainability
CUTTING EDGE CLASSROOMS
Newly-constructed classrooms include cutting-edge, sustainable elements with tangibility at the center of the design. The rooms were conceived to highlight unique ways we can “catch” sunlight, energy, and water.
DIRECT CONNECTIONS
In our solar light classroom, a single solar panel converts solar energy into electricity and stored in a battery used to provide light. When the battery runs out of power, students flip a switch to turn on Seattle City Light electricity. Every day, students analyze weather conditions to predict how long our “clean battery energy” will power the classroom lights the next day.
BOUNCING LIGHT
Our ambient lighting classroom displays a novel design by sustainable design leaders PAE Engineering, showcasing “outside the box” ways to save energy while brightening a room. A large exterior mirror sits on the roof adjacent to the tower’s north facing windows. Sunlight bounces off the mirror onto the tower’s interior walls, defusing and lighting the classroom.
CATCHING WATER
Rainwater is collected in a large exterior cistern and run through a sophisticated filtration system for use inside our “Green Room.” Incorporating exposed plumbing and “see-through” sections visible from inside the classroom, students come to understand the entire system and oversee the cistern’s water level, observing and managing the “free” water available for a variety of uses.
At ground level, students use the cistern’s rainwater as the primary watering source for watering the neighborhood p-patch they maintain. Our sustainable building design elements inspire both formal and informal analysis and appreciation every day. These systems also allow us to celebrate the benefits of sunny and rainy weather!