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Educational Plots
Sustainability Initiative Progressing
At a time when petroleum, coal, and natural gas costs soar, the economy slumps, and politicians openly debate "The Energy Crisis," we continue to make progress on the Sustainability Initiative at Pine Mountain Settlement School.A main focus of the Sustainability Initiative this year has been on food, PMSS gardens, and the PMSS kitchen. We ponder energy used in production, processing, storage, and preparation of food at PMSS as well as energy invested in food that comes off of delivery trucks. We continue to ask questions about garden harvests, menus, fruit, nut, and berry bushes and trees, canning, livestock, meat, dairy, and eggs. We are working between the kitchen, office, and sustainability staffs to re-localize some of our purchasing, simplify menus, and synchronize meal offerings with in-season harvests.
The PMSS farm staff continues with impressive production and harvest of a variety of food that is served in Laurel House. The farm and sustainability staff have worked together on pruning apple trees and developing the PMSS Community Garden (see related story). Sustainability staff and volunteers have created new gardens using double-digging and sheet mulching approaches that will increase food production in Fall 2008 and into the future. We have received donations for expansion of the PMSS orchard for Fall 2008.
The second main project of the Sustainability Initiative focuses on energy at PMSS. We continue analysis of energy use (specifically, electricity, propane, coal, gasoline, diesel, and fuel oil) across the campus. The School's Executive Director, Nancy Adams, announced an ambitious goal of a 15% reduction of energy use for the fiscal year 2008-2009. This goal requires hard thought, planning, usage changes, energy efficiency, and conservation measures. We have developed a draft working plan for efficiency and conservation measures that includes: opportunities for insulation and weatherization of windows, doors, basements, and attics across the campus; maintenance schedules to assess efficiency performance of our major appliances, heating, and cooling systems; and signage that encourages conservation for water and light switches. Recently, we have begun to envision the Energy Projects of the Sustainability Initiative as a large, multi-year project. For this year (FY 2008-2009) we will focus on defining the project, efficiency and conservation, and fund-raising on a large scale (including personal contributions, grants, and in-kind donations from manufacturers or distributors). In subsequent years, the focus of the energy project will transition to renewable energy and education. We also foresee that this project will become an example for other National Historic Landmarks, schools, and nature centers as they confront energy issues in the future.
The third project of the sustainability initiative is the educational component related to food and energy. We have developed three new class offerings: Introduction to Sustainability, Sustainable Agriculture and Food, and Sustainable Energy and Appropriate Technology. These courses will become part of the standard class offerings at PMSS. We have received input related to these new classes from Harlan County School teachers and administrators as well as the Food Literacy Project (Louisville), Burnheim Forest, the National Farm to School Network, Learning Landscapes (Abingdon, VA), and Berea College professors. In order to promote these classes and the PMSS sustainability initiative, we have discussed visiting local schools, teachers, principals, and classrooms this fall. In addition to these class offerings we have discussed the possibility of hosting workshops, trainings, demonstrations, and retreats on sustainability for PMSS staff and the public as well as larger conferences or symposia. We are collaborating with Berea College on a September visit to PMSS to discuss sustainability in Harlan and Letcher counties.
As always, the sustainability initiative presents thought-provoking and challenging issues for the PMSS community. For more information, please contact Randal Pfleger at rpfleger@pinemountainsettlementschool.com or call (606)-558-3594.
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