October 17 from 8:30 AM - 3 PM
ComEd Oak Brook Commercial Center, 1919 Swift Drive, Oak Brook
Registration Deadline: October 8

Let The Sun Shine right into your classroom! Learn how to incorporate solar energy education activities into your lesson plans. Participants receive a "NEED Schools Going Solar" hands-on kit for their grade level & additional materials created by the National Energy Education Development (NEED) Project. The workshop is free, breakfast & lunch are provided. Substitute reimbursement. Curriculum & training correlated to ISBE standards.

To register, beam onto:

Throughout the school year, the DuPage County Environmental Education Resource Room (EERR) is open M-F, 9am-4:30pm (Tuesdays, until 7pm), & on the 2nd Saturday of each month, 9-11am. Teachers are also welcome to browse the Tools for Schools & Book Rescue shelves, to see what new items have been donated for their use. For directions to the EERR in Glen Ellyn, click on:

When AVID Multimedia Library disbanded, it donated hundreds of educational videos toTools for Schools. Educators are invited to stop by our Glen Ellyn site to choose (free) videos for class. Thanks to teacher Mike Walters (Glen Oaks Therapeutic Day Center, Glendale Heights) who spent sunny days inside the ESC organizing and shelving these videos, it's much easier for teachers to search for titles.

Check out all your nooks, crannies, shelves, cubby holes and any old storage spot where old, no longer wanted, or broken electronics may be hiding out! All schools and residents are invited to bring them to SIMS (formerly United Recycling Industries) Electronics Recycling Extravaganza on Saturday, October 27, Make A Difference Day, from 8am-2pm, for proper recycling.

ACCEPTING: Old computers, TVs, VCRs, answering machines, microwaves, radios, scanners, modems, printers, monitors, fax machines, electronics games - Any electronic devise with circuitry
NOT ACCEPTING: Console TVs, large appliances, irons
LOCATION: SIMS, 1600 Harvester Street PH: 630-231-6060, 1 mile south of North Avenue; 1 block east of Powis Road (just east of DPC Airport); 1 block north of Hawthorne Lane.

Only 10% of kids across the USA regularly walk or bike to school - what a missed opportunity for parents & children alike to enjoy the shared time, conserve energy, reduce pollution & increase activity levels. According to the NY Times, part of the reason has been brought on by fears of traffic hazards & stranger danger. To encourage walking, municipalities are seeking funding for more sidewalks, safer bike lanes, and other pedestrian measures. Teachers, make "great strides" with your Physical, Environmental, Health Ed & all classes: observe Walk to School Day. Educational & promotional materials:

Since passage of the Anti-Idling Act, school buses & trucks can no longer idle near schools. What a great time to clear the air and prohibit all vehicles (parents, visitors, etc.) from idling. At a recent meeting, Dist. 45 Sup't. Dr. Schewe heard an excellent suggestion: ask parents also to reduce carbon monoxide emissions by politely asking them for their help in protecting the health of our students - their kids - by turning off their engines when they wait for their children.

Easy to read signage in front of the school and around the parking lot will go a long way to help enforce your program and curb this unhealthy (and wasteful!) practice. Act up (politely please!) for kids' health at school, with an anti-idling policy!

The Clean Water Act (CWA) is the cornerstone of surface water quality protection in the US. From the Water Environment Federation: (The CWA is) - considered one of the most successful pieces of federal legislation ever crafted; evidence of its success is widespread and unmistakable. Its broad goal is "restoring & maintaining the chemical, physical and biological integrity of the nation's waters so that they can support the protection & propagation of fish, shellfish & wildlife recreation in & on the water."

Co-author of the Clean Water Act and past Science Advisor to the Secretary of the Army, who led a national effort dedicated to cleaning up our streams, rivers, lakes & oceans by eliminating point & non-point pollution sources, is DuPage County's own Jack Sheaffer. He has been instrumental in many pivotal water-related issues, & is currently recognized as a leading authority on the reclamation & reuse of wastewater. Happy Anniversary, Dr. Sheaffer. Click for an introduction to the

Teachers: bring current scientific issues to life in your classroom. It is impossible to lead a healthy, productive life without clean drinking water, yet more than a billion people lack access to it. A new web resource will "provide international decision makers with-scientific & technical information about the options (already) available to enhance the safety and availability of drinking water supplies" This first-of-its- kind resource is a joint effort of US National Academy of Sciences, Global Health & Education Foundation, and more than 125 engineering, medical & science academies worldwide.

Listed are 2007-2008 grant, award and contest opportunities for your school and your students. Please follow the links to learn about them, deadlines, and contact information.

Your students will really dig class, when you take them on a "backstage" tour of an excavation, explore a paleontological dig site, and discover pre-history, DuPage style! Now showing at a website near you - the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County - is a series of videos featuring the unearthing of a Mastodon and highlights of "Mastodon Camp" at Pratt's Wayne Woods Forest Preserve in Wayne.

The camp was a one-of-a-kind educational program, a joint project of the FPD & The Field Museum, which brought 36 local students and K-12 teachers together in August to take part in a scientific excavation. All the lucky campers dug for and mapped out objects they found.

Schools Coast to Coast Want Green-Building Certification
In 2000, a paltry 4 schools applied for US Green Building Council Certification. Today, 360 K-12 schools await certification, and 60 have already certified. School officials, parents & teachers want in on the green-building trend. According to USGBC's Rachel Gutter, green-certified schools around the country are reporting increased test scores, fewer sleepers, teacher retention, and they save districts up to $100,000 (now that's one gorgeous shade of green!) annually in water, energy, and health-care costs.

How Is YOUR SCHOOL Doing?
Schools needn't wait for USGBC certification to make a world of difference in their buildings and with their students, parents & staffs. Step by step is how we all learn to walk. Have you earned your Earth Flag? Earth Flag Recertification? The E-Flag? Do you have an eco-club, want help to start one up or to improve the one you've got? Don't miss our Eco-Club Workshop, Tuesday, Oct. 2nd, from 4:30-6pm.

• Return to school refreshed, with a world of resources, programs, projects, activities and ideas spinning like a globe inside your head (in a good way)!
• Learn about the free teacher modeling programs we can bring right into your classroom: Waste Audit, Energy Bike, Groundwater Flow Model, Watershed Model
• Hear about free in-services, staff meetings & workshops we can conduct right at school to train your teachers about energy & water conservation, waste reduction, green chemistry, green buildings, etc.

2005-2015 - United Nation's International Decade for Action: Water For Life
October - National Energy Awareness Month
October - National Children's Health Month
October International Walk to School Month
Tues. Oct. 2 -- 4:30-6pm -- Eco-Club Sponsors K-8 Teacher Workshop
Wed. Oct. 3 -- 6:30-8:30pm -- Alternative Fuels 101 MS/HS Teacher Workshop
October 3 Energy Star "Change A Light" Day
October 3 Walk to School Day
October 5 U.N. World Teachers' Day
October 6 - 10am-3pm Churchill Park Environmental Fair
October 8 Deadline: Solar Schools Workshop Registration
October 9 Deadline: Kane-DuPage Arbor Day Mini Grant
Thur. Oct. 11 -- 4:30-6:30 -- Energy Bike K-12 Teacher Workshop
Thur. Oct. 11 -- 6:30-8:30pm -- Energy Bike K-12 Teacher Workshop
Tues. Oct. 16 -- 4:30-6pm -- Make 'n Take A Natural Resources Globe ES Teacher Workshop
Wed. Oct. 17 - 8:30am- 3pm Solar Schools K-12 Teacher Workshop, Oak Brook
October 18 Anniversary, Clean Water Act
October 18 Water Monitoring Day
October 27 -- 8am-2pm -- Sims (United Recycling Industries) Electronics Recycling, West Chicago
October 27 Make A Difference Day
Tues. Oct. 30 -- 8:30am-2:45pm -- Safe Chemicals in Education Workshop for Science Teachers
October 31 Deadline: President's Environmental Youth Award
November 1 Deadline: Kids Wetlands Walks Drawing Contest
November 7 Deadline: IL Zero Waste Grant
November 15 America Recycles Day
November 30 Deadline: IL Schoolyard Habitat Action Grant:
November 30 Deadline: Seaworld Environmental Excellence Awards
2008 U.N. International Year of Sanitation 2 issues to be addressed: Water Quality & Wastewater Treatments
2008 U.N. International Year of Planet Earth