DC Middle School Students Get Energized with SEDS

On Thursday, November 13, middle school students at Oyster-Adams Bilingual School in Northwest DC became energy auditors for a day. By completing an assignment to audit their school grounds, the students were participating in a training exercise conducted by Saving Energy in DC Schools Program (SEDS), which is operated in partnership by the Alliance’s Green Schools Program and the DC Energy Office, and funded under the DC Public Service Commission by the Natural Gas Trust Fund.

Now in its first year, the program aims to empower students to teach their parents and others about energy efficiency in the home. The students acquire knowledge of energy efficiency and consumption through exercises that utilize school grounds as a demonstration laboratory.

Thursday's training involved hands-on lessons about key energy issues such as electricity generation, wattage measurements and lumen measurements. The Alliance provided Green Schools Tool Kits with professional-quality diagnostic tools to encourage and involve students in the collection and analysis of energy data at their school. For example, students learned how to use watt meters to measure the energy consumed by a school computer. In order to better understand how energy is distributed, students took a special tour of some lesser-known school facilities, including the boiler room and mechanical closets.

SEDS energy audit training in the 14 participating schools is ongoing, and students are encouraged to create their own energy-saving ideas and share them with other schools on a SEDS web-group site. At the end of the school year, SEDS will distribute awards for various energy efficiency initiatives.