Green Team at Blessed Sacrament

A team of students, two dedicated teachers and a team of parents continue the Green Team at Blessed Sacrament (the first Green Team meeting was held in January 2009).

Due to the work of the Green Team student ambassadors, teacher coordinators and parent volunteers, Blessed Sacrament School became a certified Ontario EcoSchool (Silver designation) in May 2009; they were successfully certified as a GOLD EcoSchool as of June 2011. This certification recognizes achievement in 4 key areas: energy conservation, waste minimization, ecological literacy and school ground greening.
The goal for 2011/2012 is to maintain Gold designation.

Our school continues to move toward being environmentally aware:
- sending paper-based letters to only 1 child in a family
- transition communication to parents from paper-based documents to email

Litterless Lunches

In order to reduce the waste going to landfill sites and to improve our environmental footprint, the Green Team is promoting Litterless lunches every Wednesday. Students will receive a raffle ticket each Wednesday that they have a litterless lunch and be eligible to win green prizes at the end of each month.

Litterless lunches are defined as:
1. Snacks and food packed in reusable and resealable containers (not disposable bags or packaging)
2. Leftover food (which can be disposed of in the home green bin program) returned back home in their containers.

Current year (2011/2012) Green Team

September 2011: Reinitiated the ThinkRecycle campaign.
Restart litterless lunches on Wednesdays starting October 5th, 2011.

2010/2011 Green Team

The 2010/2011 Green Team participated in various events to bring environmental awareness to our community:

October 2010 to June 2011: Reinitiated the ThinkRecycle campaign; 242 Cartridges and 47 cell phones were recycled, 131.45lbs of waste was diverted, 4 trees were planted and a total of $265.30 was earned through their fundraising program.
February 2011 to June 2011: Initiated a waste-free/boomerang lunch campaign; Green Team members inspected the lunches of all the students on Wednesdays and distributed tickets to those with waste-free lunches (using containers that are sent back home with zero waste thrown in the classroom's garbage can).
February 25 and 28, 2011: Participated in the Roots and Shoots eco-seminars for grade 1-6.
March 22, 2011: Participated in the We Unite for Water presentation in celebration of World Water week (March 21st-25th, 2011)
March 25, 2011: Coordinated the Earth Hour participation of the school between 10am to 11am
April 27, 2011: Planted a tree in the Butterfly Garden.
April 15, 2011: Coordinated the Earth Day 20-minute makeover for the school community.
May 6, 2011: Participated in Take Your Kids Outside Day; students and staff were challenged to go outside for as little as 30 minutes.
May 2011: Designated the school as a plastic water bottle-free zone.
June 3, 2011: Coordinated the annual Planting Day with JK/SK students, Green Team members and Green Team parent group; a mixture of perennials and annuals were planted in front of the school.
June 2011: Certified as a GOLD EcoSchool.
June 2011: Participated in a water science workshop for grade 8s at Chatsworth Ravine.

2009/2010 Green Team

February 2009 to June 2010: Initiated a waste-free lunch campaign; Green Team members inspected the lunches of all the students on Wednesdays and distributed tickets to those with waste-free lunches. Tickets were drawn at the end of each month to award prizes.
April 2010 to June 2010: Initiated the ThinkRecycle campaign; 120 Cartridges and 37 cell phones were recycled, 59.44lbs of waste was diverted, 3 trees were planted and a total of $126.70 was earned through their fundraising program.
March 26, 2010: Coordinated the Earth Hour participation of the school between 10am to 11am.
April 23, 2010: Coordinated the Earth Day 20-minute makeover for the school community.
May 8, 2010: Assisted Toronto Hydro at the annual Fun Fair to host a spring Toronto Hydro Great Light Bulb Exchange event for our community.
May 2010: Certified as a SILVER EcoSchool.
June 4, 2010: Coordinated the annual Planting Day with JK/SK students, Green Team members and Green Team parent group; a mixture of perennials and annuals were planted in front of the school.

Parent Green Team

In conjunction with the teacher-led student Green Team, a group of volunteer parents will also help with the implementation of greening initiatives and education at our school. If you would like to join this team, please contact the school at 416-393-5226. Thank you!

Earth Hour

Blessed Sacrament will participate in the Earth Hour Challenge!

Earth Hour 2011
For the past three years, the Green Team has taken the lead in promoting the Toronto Catholic District School Board's Earth Hour Challenge. This year, the global Earth Hour challenge will take place on Saturday March 26th from 8:30pm to 9:30pm; Blessed Sacrament School will be holding a symbolic Earth Hour event on Friday March 25th from 10am to 12m. For 1 hour, the school will turn off external lights and all computers, reduce hallway lights and classroom lights to a minimum, and eliminate all non-essential lights in staff areas including staff room and offices; students are also asked to bring in a litterless lunch on Friday. They also encourage families to participate in the hour long Canadian Earth Hour event on Saturday March 26th from 8:30pm to 9:30pm.

What is Earth Hour?
The World Wildlife Fund created Earth Hour to help people that are concerned about our planet and want to show their support for action on climate change. Earth Hour began in Sydney in 2007, when 2.2 million homes and businesses switched off their lights for one hour. In 2008, over 50 million people switched off their lights. In 2009, over 4000 cities in 88 countries officially switched off to pledge their support for the planet, making Earth Hour 2009 the world's largest global climate change initiative. Earth Hour 2010 became the biggest Earth Hour ever with a record 128 countries and territories joining the global display of climate action.
Earth Hour is a symbolic event. Turning off our lights for an hour won't stop climate change but it does demonstrate that our individual action is important and adds up to make a big difference. More importantly, it sends a very powerful message to government and world leaders that people want policies and regulations put in place that can achieve meaningful emission reduction to help fight climate change.

Keep it up!
And don’t stop at turning off the lights! Think about what else can be done to reduce your footprint like taking transit, unplugging unused electrical appliances and washing your clothes in cold water. The list is endless and your action will make a big difference.

This year, when the lights go back on, we want you to think about what you can change in your daily life that will benefit the planet.
Thank you for participating in Earth Hour!

Green Team Ideas

Read the ideas that the Green Team has compiled to help us become more green:

What can you do to become environmentally aware?

Here are just a few suggestions:

School

send a litterless lunch with your child (pack all food items in reusable containers and send drinks in reusable bottles)
say NO to bottled water
if you are currently receiving paper communication from the school, please contact the school and provide your current email address
try to walk or bike to and from school as much as possible and leave the car at home

Home

turn off lights when they are not needed or when it is bright outside; use motion detection lights when possible instead of leaving lights on
don't let the water run constantly while you brush your teeth or wash/rinse dishes
repair leaking faucets
take shorter showers
turn off the TV, computer and other electrical items when not in use (especially at the end of the day)
donate gently used clothes, furniture, toys and other items to charity organizations (such as Pass It On)
replace your current batteries with rechargeable batteries
replace incandescent light bulbs with more more energy-efficient, longer-lasting high efficiency fluorescent bulbs
take your name off unwanted mailing lists to reduce the amount of junk mail
ensure that windows and door frames are sealed properly to avoid heat or cool air from escapting
turn the temperature on your water heater down
use power bars to minimize standby power losses on entertainment systems and computers; turn off computers when not in use
use electricity when it costs less during non-peak times (i.e., after 8pm)

Shopping

purchase products and supplies with less or reusable packaging
use cloth, reusable bags for shopping
purchase products and services from companies that are environmentally conscious

and

reduce, reuse or recycle as many items as possible to save energy and raw materials!

Interesting Links

Do What You Can website helps you find places to drop-off household hazardous and special wastes and unwanted electronics that cannot be put in your Blue Box and should not go in the garbage. You can search for places by municipality, postal code or material
Every Kilowatt Counts website has Residential programs, efficiency tools and tips and a Kids Corner to learn about how to save electricity and the environment
Earth Hour is taking place on Saturday, March 28, 2009 at 8:30pm. Earth Hour has made an impact: in 2007, 2.2 million people participated and in 2008, 50 million people in 35 countries switched off their lights for Earth Hour!
The City of Toronto Environment website has ideas and lists what the city has done to contribute to a greener city
Environment Canada has ideas that you can take to reduce waste, save resources and prevent pollution.
Live Green Toronto website offers residents with information to help them live green and provides expert advice to help neighbourhood and community groups get organized and take action.
Register to have your name and address removed from marketing lists through the Canadian Marketing Association "Do Not Contact Service" which is offered free of charge to consumers to reduce the number of marketing offers they receive by mail.
You can also register with the "National Do Not Call List"
Toronto Recycles - a useful guide to what can and cannot be recycled in the City of Toronto

If you have any other interesting links, please email the Website Administrator.