Choosing to Participate:
A Social Justice Service Project on Sustainability

Today was finally the day of learning! I was really excited about my and Gaia’s workshop. I knew a lot of people had wanted to be in it, and I was looking forward to seeing who would there. The workshop started off a little rocky, because everyone wanted to do the same recipe, and we didn’t have enough of the ingredients for that many people to do it. However, we soon cleared it up, and people made several different recipes, in groups or pairs. Almost everything went well. It all looked good, worked, and smelled AMAZING. The rest of the day was interesting and fun. I especially liked the cake! I think the day went well in general, and I’m looking forward to seeing future days of learning.

I was a little nervous about the day of learning, whether or not people would understand why we needed to reuse the starburst wrappers, whether people would understand how to make the bracelets and enjoy to workshop, however my thoughts were not at all justified. It turned out to be incredibly fun, and people were really starting to think about reusing materials and asking some interesting questions. Phil helped facilitate the conversations upon entering the room and quizzing us on how this was sustainable, when we bought the starburst instead of reusing ones we had already gotten. People started throwing around ideas and coming up with ways it both was, and wasn’t sustainable. I think it went very well and I was very relieved that all the hard work and speculation came out positively. 

I think overall the day of learning went very well.  My workshop was a lot harder than I though it was going to be and I learned that we had to be a lot more direct and not leave anything out in the open.  In the first session one of the groups was not very responsible with the candy.  We then knew we had to plan out everything beforehand so that they had a plan to work off of.  Both groups in the second session were very good and knew what they were doing.  This was definitely due to us not just throwing candy to them, but going over different kinds of things they could put on their house and then helping them to make a plan of what they were going to put on the house.  I think I defintely learned a lot and realized how to run my own workshop.  I also thought that all of the speakers were very interesting.  I thought Josh gave a very interesting presentation and I thought it was very interesting that all of the different schools did a lot to conteract global warming.  I thought that if all of us did just a little bit of that it would make a very big difference.

-Quinn

Gaia and I were originally going to just have people trying on organic beauty products for our workshop, but then we realized that would be kind of boring. When we found out we would be able to have a double period, we realized we could have people make their own! We found a website called makeyourowncosmetics.com, and we picked a bunch of recipes off of that. We are really excited.

My work shop was the solar shop and we had a lot of fun.  I thought we did ok for the first time teaching kids.  We had mostly 5th graders about one sixth grader and two eighth graders, and we tried to mix the groups up so they weren’t all with there friends.  I think that all the kids really enjoyed our workshop.  I learned today that we use a lot of stuff, and wast them when we can reuse them, like bottles, and plastic bags.  I never knew that we used so many paper bags though.  I was confused by the video with the green guy on guitar.   -David 

Today was the day of learning, I think it went well and everyone seemed to learn a lot. My workshop Group “The Little Green School House” didn’t seem to have a lot of flaws, it went smoothly. we had to think on our feet for a bit because we forgot to get a piece of information we didn’t realize we needed. other than that, the kids in our group really seemed to enjoy our class. One of the kids in the group came up with very creative ideas and was the winner of the prize (lolipops) which we end up giving everyone in the class anyway for such good work they put in. In general I think that they learned a lot from our class. I learned a lot from the videos and the people who spoke to us about sustainability. I was shocked when Josh showed us pictures that looked like nothing from far away but when he zoomed in there were thousands of the item and then a fact about the picture. The whole day went well, and I hadn’t realized how hard it is to teach a class. By the end of the day everyone was very tired, but the cake was a great way of ending this project and a nice congratulations. What amazes me is that the day went by in a flash and we have been preparing for it for so long and now its over. Today was a was a great way of not only ending this project but teaching everyone in the middle school about it. -Hannah Rifkin 

This post and the following post were saved as word documents on my computer.  I added one or two sentences at the end.

Today after school, I went to the center of architecture for an interview with a woman named Grace Huan.  I had never been there before, but I had the general whereabouts of where it was.  Sadly, I was kept in study group so I got there late.  I missed part of the interview, but I got the gist of what happened while I was gone.  Grace was very charismatic and easy to talk to.  We kept coming up for questions for her, even when we were finished with the ones we had prepared.  She was also informative, and explained many things I knew nothing about.  For example, I now understand more how the LEED system works, and how it is enforced.  It went very well overall, and it went by a lot quicker than I expected.  I learned quite a bit from the interview, and was able to use most of it in my exposé.

 -The Rob

Today, me and Jack came after school to paint more of out part of the door.  I finished my sketches for the door and starting measuring how long the train should be.  Carin gave me a ruler to do this and it was fun.  Me and Jack planned to connect our paintings using the musical notes passing through both out paintings.  I think this is a good idea so even though all the paintings are different they have a connection to them.  I started putting my letters on the door and then messed up on them so I tried and tried again to fix it and finally made it look good.  This is a very fun project that I’m doing.  Carin told us that when were done we are going to present it at some famous place.  

Worked at a goat cheese stand from 10am-1pm

I decided not to write a letter to the Kimberly Clark company because I could not write a whole journal post on how I wrote a letter.

I have an idea to present and attract more people to come to our station for later, maybe buy some grass fed beef an give it to  whoever comes to our station. just an idea

On Tuesday, April 8th Deion and  I visited the AIANY Center For Architecture to look at the Co-Evolution exhibit.  We learned about a new Shanghai SubCity that they are planning to build to become more sustainable.  The SubCity is a urban island inside of big park.  This brings people closer to nature and with the design of the SubCity, from anywhere in the city you will be in five minutes of a park or green space.  This also goes for monorails, which they have placed in the densist part of the nine neighborhoods in the city, to greatly reduce the amount of cars.  The city also has many cycling paths to encourage cycling and limit pollution caused be cars.  This great “5 minute city” promotes walking and cycling as well as the use of public transportation.  The buildings that are in the city are called “green mountains.”  They are built so that everyone is able to have a terrace and the design of the buildings does many great things for the city.  Another fascisnating thing about this city is the “breeze valleys”.  The buildings were built to capture the wind coming off the river and other places.  The breezes flow through the city to cool it down and then are captured by windmills that are disguised as street lights.  This renewable energy is used to power many public facilities.  Another renewable energy source they use are solar panels.  In the neighborhood where there is the most sun, all houses have solar panels on the roofs.  To encourage recycling the city implemented a plan that gives money for cash.  People are able to give resource waste and in return get money.  Another thing that really amazed me about this city was a fact that I saw that said “95% of the city can be used to bring back trees.”  This meant that people are able to grow trees on their terraces and other places in the city.  Unlike the rest of china, the SubCity has a very good water cleaning system.  Their is a underground root system that is able to clean almost all of the waste water and this is helped by the great park around the city.  The park around city also helps the city during its cold winters and hot summers.  The earth is able to heat the city in the winter and cool it in the summer.    The city also uses some of the earths renewable energy and buildings in the city are able to use 1/3 less energy than normal.  I thought all of these things were very impressive and a small step to crack down on global warming in china.

-Quinn

A few weeks back, Jack, Jimmy and I all went to Applewood, a resturant in Brooklyn that serves only organic and grass fed food. We went and learned alot about organic food, sadly, it was some of the information we already know about. It was nice to find out that many resturants use organic food though. Also, some notes were lost for this meeting so i cannot inform you about everything. My apologies

Deion Desir

I met with Sophie and Hannah at 10:am in the Farmers market.  As soon as we got there we were set off with certain farmers.  I got hooked up with a man named Andy.  Andy ran a syrup stand and was very well known with the people.  He taught me about syrups and the way they were made and stuff like that.  He served wide variety’s of maple items, from candy’s to sugar to butter.  He had me work on the cash register, and I ran the shop whenever he left, which was quite often.

Hannah and I met at the Green market at 10:am.  From there we met Davy, and he set us up with different farmers at the market.  I met this man who owned a jam and honey stand.  He taught me the ropes on the whole jam experience and I soon became an expert in the jam business.  He had me organize the jam storage, and then I worked the cash register.  I learned very much about the whole honey system as well, his wife and daughter made their own Jam.  His work was very inspiring to me.

When I talked earlier about starting a “run” to raise money for mosquito nets to help prevent Malaria, I did not explain what a serious disease Malaria is and how many lives it takes. “… nearly 3,000 kids die every day in Africa from malaria. And according to the World Health Organization, transmission of the disease would be reduced by 60% with the use of mosquito nets and prompt treatment for the infected.”(Sports Illustrated 5/1/2006, Vol. 104 Issue 18, p78). The number of kids dying every day in Africa is the equivalant of 10 times population of the LREI lower school and middle school combined. You also might wonder what malaria is.”Malaria is caused by a parasite that is transmitted from one human to another by the bite of infected Anopheles mosquitoes.” (The NEW YORK TIMES http://health.nytimes.com/health/guides/disease/malaria/overview.html?8qa&scp=1-spot&sq=malaria&st=nyt). Malaria attacks the red blood cells causing the chills, muscle cramps, sweating, convulsions, vomiting, and in some cases a coma. If the disease is not treated the victim may die. Some people native to malaria stricken places have developed an immunity to the disease, but visitors must take extreme precautions to defend themselves, such as wearing protective clothing, using repellant, and even taking anti-malaria drugs.

We spent around 3 hours with Mary Cleaver, shopping for fruit and washing potatoes for the movie screening the following day. ava 

Last Wednesday my group and I met Mary Cleaver at the Union Square Green Market. We organized to meet at 9:30 am at the corner of 16th and Union Square West. We browsed through the stalls with Mary while she tested the fruit and vegetables for ripeness. She mentioned that she was interested in installing  a composte system in the kitchen of her restaurant. We talked to a woman that runs a composte plant and would be willing to help Mary. After that we went to buy twenty-four pounds of apples and carried them to The Cleaver Company in Chelsea Market. When we arrived Mary told us that we would be doing some work in the kitchen. She handed us aprons and introduced us to the head chef. He lead us to a giant sink with about 200 potatoes in a cart beside it. We were instructed to pick out the small potatoes, wash them twice, then dry them. After a hour and a half we had washed all the small potatoes plus another 50-ish large ones. I learned that if you want to start composting that you can just bring the waste to a stall at the Green Market. Also that 12 pounds of apples is a lot heavier than it sounds.Ava 

hey, today during core cameron showed me this really cool site that talks about this art gallery going on now. it has dumbo oil drums, basically they are cool sculptures and different pieces of art all made out of only oil drums. we are thinking of going to see it one of these days since it seems really interesting. for anyone who seems interested, heres the link below.

http://www.treehugger.com/files/2008/03/recycled-oil-drum-art-exhibition-dumbo-brooklyn.php

——Emma

Today, Ella, Brianna, Amy, Lilly, Cameron, Jack G, Henry, Emma, Maya PH, Aliza, and I met during recess to learn about a sustainability project that we will be starting soon. This project is a City Arts Project that will be directed by Paul, an Indian from New Orleans. We will be painting a door that will be given to New Orleans that has messages of hope on it. We will also be including some drawings about the earth. I think I did well by listening to what Paul and the director of City Arts had to say about this new project. We didn’t do too much except learn about the history of the arts in New Orleans, and watch a short video of some Mardi Gras dances, and other New Orleans celebrations, but we also had a few minutes at the very end to come up with a drawing of what we might like to paint on the door. I felt very proud of what I came up with, although it is still a work in progress, and I only had three or four minutes to come up with an idea. I hope that the more we have to get together and come up with ideas, the more I can get into this project. I was surprised by how much of our music and arts, comes from New Orleans. I’m not sure what life would be like without Louis Armstrong’s music, or the Mardi Gras celebrations! I was interested in what other City Arts sustainability projects were being planned, I think that art is one of the best ways to get something across, especially if kids are the ones doing it, because I think people are amazed by what such young people can accomplish. I hope that for the next session I will be able to finish my idea for the door’s design. I enjoyed the first session, especially since I love art, and I can’t wait until the next one if I decide to continue this project.-Amy 

Brianna and I both got in contact with people from city parks, both over the phone and through email checking to see what time we could meet them. We contacted Anne Frederick, Mike Mc Queen, and Sarah Erinsin. The whole process was different then what I was used to. A formal phone call was so weird compared to when I call my friends up on the telephone. I didn’t feel like I was helping out anyone yet because I didn’t do anything. It annoyed me when the place where they wanted us to meet them at was too far away for us to go so we didn’t end up going but we thanked them all for contacting us back and we said it just wasn’t going to work with our schedules.-Amy 

I took a cab to the Greenmarket where I met Hannah.  From there we met Davey, who introduced us to the people we would be working with.  Hanna would be working with a woman named Lynn who ran a goat cheese stand.  Davey introduced me to a man named Dave who ran a jam, jelly, honey, and maple syrup stand.  When I arrived he asked me to read up on him, and handed me several articles.  I found that Dave made his honey, right here in New York City.  He manages this by having dozens of honey hives on rooftops of skyscrapers.  After I was done reading this article, he told me what he could.  He lives in Berkshire, Massachusetts.  His wife and daughter make all the jam themselves, and most of the jams that were being sold were just made the week before.  Then to help I started organizing the jam storage.  Then I learned about each jam, the ingredients, the differences between the jams, and the prices. 

On Saturday morning Lili and I got an unexpected call from Davy, saying he was the only one at the managers booth that day and would we please come help. We were happy to oblige, and arrived shortly at 12:00. There, we met with Davy and were given a list of farmers who were not there that day, and a walkie talkie. After grabbing a cheap but delicious breakfast of organic pumpkin, apple, carrot, and banana bread, we settled in. Customers came by to pick out free magazines, free recipes, and lists of market times, but mostly to ask questions. We answered questions about volunteering, which farmers were at the market, when and what time the market was open, and to take many complaints. It was really fun, because it made me feel responsible and happy because I was spending hours at a place that I have always loved. Although my feet were falling of from the cold, and we met a few strange people, helping out was really important and totally worth it. I learned more about how the market runs and works than I already did. At the end of our shift, we went to talk to one of the farmers, Karen, who has a sheep farm about when we would come. I can’t wait to work at the actual stalls, and I’m really excited to see so many parts of the farmers market.

On 2/9 I spent two and a half hours working at AIANY Center for Architecture. -Niles

This is a reflection on my first bake sale. My progress of it can be seen in my log. I worked with Hannah S, Sophie, Amy, and Brianna to bake, frost, and sell the baked goods. I think that this whole thing went really well. Aside from the fact that some of the brownies were so crumbly we couldn’t sell them, everything was okay. At first, when I was selling everything, I thought I wouldn’t even have enough money to pay my mom back for all the ingredients! I was really scared. But I ended up making about a $100 profit! The whole time of this project I felt fine and content. I had a great time making all the things. What really surprised me about this was how many people there are in the lobby as soon as school gets out. Everything just dissappears immediately.

Something I learned while doing this project is that greasing the pan when baking is totally necessary, and if you don’t you only get half the cake out. I also learned that random strangers get surprisiongly annoyed when offered baked goods for good causes. What I learned about sustainability with this project was that although it can sometimes be really easy to make a difference if you just put in a little effort, it can also sometimes be really hard. Adding up all the time, I think I worked on this for at least eleven hours! I did not learn anything about the organization’s inner workings from this project. A goal I would set for my next work is to get more helpers ahead of time because everything seemed kind of last - minute to me. I don’t have any questions for anyone this time. What other steps I need to take for Madness for Malaria is to think of more ideas of what I can do to raise money besides bake sales. I might do one more bake sale, but I want to do other things as well. I want to remember everything I am writing here for my Day of Learning Presentation. Unfortunately, there is no other material that I have to post, because I currently have no camera.

I sold alot of the things! I spent 3 hours selling about half of the baked goods.