Starting Tuesday, January 25th, Choate will participate for the second year in the Green Cup Challenge, a four-week long interscholastic energy-conserving competition involving 38 schools.
As the Green Cup Challenge has become more widespread, Jin Ha ‘08, the president of Student Council, thinks that students will become motivated to work harder. “More students will realize that we can make a difference,” Ha said.
According to the Green Cup committee, Choate will make a video to involve the student body, although this year it will not be obligatory. “I think it helps a lot in terms of kicking up the whole competition.” Ha said.
Choate’s performance during the competition last year was unsatisfactory. Out of fifteen participating schools, Choate did not come close to the top five in terms of energy saving. One of the primary goals, saving more energy than Deerfield, was also not met. The energy saved was tabulated by comparing the amount of energy used to the previous month. The dramatic temperature drop between January and February caused electricity use to increase as members of the Choate community turned on electric heaters and inhibited the success of the school.
This time, the ranking is evaluated by comparing the percentage reduction of energy use in February with that of the previous February, a change the student council felt would even the playing field and would increase Choate’s chances for success. According to Mr. Ford, the Dean of Students, there have been some improvements in utilities which will bring better results. “We live in a big campus and we have a lot of buildings some of which are antiquated and are not running particularly efficiently,” Mr. Ford conceded, “but we are doing better.”
The Green Cup committee, led by Ms. Homan, Mr. Cahoon, and Mr. Yanelli, is making a layout plan for the upcoming competition. Students who are in environmental groups or who have shown interest are also helping out the committee. The Green Cup committee will soon elect C-Proctors and Green Cup captains to encourage our student body to conserve energy.
“The plans outlined are still tentative,” said committee member and co-president of Students Against Climate Change, Sofia Gearty ’09. According to Gearty, the committee will ask Mr. Ford to confirm its layout plan, which features a Green Cup dance and the sale of carbon-neutral T-shirts. A strategy circulating discussion is to decrease the temperature in buildings by three to four degrees.
Jin Ha does not believe this temperature drop will be taxing. “We are going to get used to it. If it gets very cold, three to four degrees decrease is not going to freeze anyone.” Jin Ha said.
Although new strategies are being added, a few of the old ones will be removed. The inter-dormitory competition within the Green Cup will not be held this year because Choate has two encompassing electric meters which make it difficult to measure the energy use of individual dorm.
To advertise and promote energy awareness, the committee will have a banner on which all the students can sign their names as they did last year. Small banners will be distributed to every dorm to encourage students to turn off their lights and unplug their cell-phone chargers. “I think one of our goals is to make this energy conservation a sustainable thing rather than a four-week thing.” Rebecca Marber ’09, co-president of the Environmental Action Coalition, said.
Jin Ha will carry on the legacy of Jeff Rosen ’07 the former Student Council president in continuing the council’s active role with his efforts for this venture. Ha will assign one academic building to each student council member. With the aid of the academic department heads or chief supervisors, these student council members will ensure that no lights or computers are left on unnecessarily. “Wherever we can turn the lights off, we will definitely turn them off.” Ha exclaimed.
This year, Choate will focus less on the competition with Deerfield and more on the energy-saving itself. “We want people to focus more on the goal of this competition, which is to save energy.” Sophia Gearty said. The Green Cup Challenge will focus on education aspects to teach students that they have to change their daily habits to stop wasting the resources.
There will be an award if Choate wins the competition or gets better results than Deerfield. Ha met with Mr. Shanahan last Friday to ask about a President’s Day in the spring. The outcome of this meeting remains unknown. “Of course, if we beat all those schools, there will be a huge prize.” Mr. Ford said. “If we have a better reduction than Deerfield, hopefully Mr. Shanahan will let us have the President’s Day in the spring,” Jin Ha added.
Despite the outcome of last year’s competition, the Student Council and the Green Cup Committee remain optimistic.
