Dare you!

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Cindy Parker

On May 24, the US Department of Energy (DOE) joined with US Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan and Dr. Francis Eberle, Executive Director of the National Science Teachers Association to announce the launch of a new energy education initiative entitled America’s Home Energy Education Challenge.  This is a great, interactive program developed to help educate students about the benefits of energy efficiency, motivate students to play and active role in how their families use energy, and help families across the country save energy dollars.  Intent of the program is to encourage students, teachers and families to learn more about energy consumption and efficiency and become more aware of how homes, schools, and utilities are interconnected within the community – while inspiring students to pursue studies in science, technology, engineering and mathematics.

“America’s Home Energy Education Challenge leverages the enthusiasm and curiosity of students to encourage families across the country to reduce energy waste in their homes while inspiring the next generation of America’s energy leaders,” said DOE Secretary Steven Chu.

Secretary Duncan added, “We all need to pitch in to make our homes and schools more energy efficient. America’s Home Energy Education Challenge will teach students how science and common sense efforts can help all of us to do our part to save energy and save money as well as protect the environment.

“Science teachers nationwide will recognize that America’s Home Energy Education Challenge is a valuable teaching tool that encourages active learning about energy and science and will help students to connect science to real world applications,” according to Dr. Eberle.

This fall, participating school teams in grades 3-8 will be asked to implement energy efficiency activities that reduce the energy use in their homes. Teams will be asked to monitor and measure their energy consumption over a specific three month period and compare it to data from the same period the year before, to determine if they have successfully reduced energy use.

Teams composed of students and families will volunteer to participate and reduce energy waste in their homes. To generate further enthusiasm and program participation, schools will be encouraged to compete against each other or establish competitions within their own schools between different grades, classrooms or clubs. Expertise and resources to the teams will be provided by local utilities, non-profit groups and professional organizations.

A winning school, grade, classroom or club will be chosen by teachers at the school. The local competition winners will then be entered into 11 regional competitions, broken out by climate zone. The first place regional award winners will be entered into the national competition. National winners will be selected based on their level of participation, energy savings, and overall quality or creativity of the competition. Participating schools can compete for more than $200,000 in prizes that will be distributed at the regional and national levels of the competition, including additional prizes for honorable mention competitions. All participating schools and students will receive a DOE certificate of recognition, along with the intrinsic benefit of saving money and energy.

The second part of America’s Home Energy Education Challenge is the Energy Fitness Award. This program is modeled after the President’s Physical Fitness award and challenges students to better understand basic energy issues, including the connection between energy use and energy bills. Through the program’s online activities, students will improve their knowledge of energy use in buildings, better understand energy saving techniques, identify local energy saving opportunities, develop an energy savings plan, and learn to undertake various energy use calculations. The National Energy Fitness Awards will be awarded on a school-by-school basis.

By improving energy efficiency education, the DOE is promoting the use of math and science skills that can be applied in a broad range of other educational and daily activities.

Do you dare to take the challenge?

Further details can be found at the Home Energy Challenge website.