trash for teaching (a national program, i think)
walk to school day
no waste lunch box

Our PTO just had our planning meeting for next year. We've never done anything before, but two new teachers joined our PTO and had put on a Nature Night at their previous school. From what they told us, it included several booths relating to nature such as someone from our local animal control with a few animals, a guy named Butterfly Dan who does an exhibit on the stages of a butterfly, a booth set up by the local audobon society, a booth by the forest rangers and more like that. There were also craft booths set up for kids to make nature related items such as bird feeders made from pine cones and stuff like that. We're really looking forward to adding this to our calendar this year. We've planned it during the week of April 21st since both Earth Day and Arbor Day are in that week.

geesh.. I am feeling really guilty.. must say , though that most individual classrooms in our school do different projects and acknowledge it in their own ways - we just don't do it as a PTO.

texas state PTA along with local area and council promote the Environmental awareness Contest. It used to be a poster contest and now it is more like Reflections. I was the chair this year and we had 5 students at State. My daughter happened to bring home an Award of Merit in the First grade Photography category!

I hope more schools participate in this! I know this was our first year and it was just in Texas. But the students that participated I believe learned a great deal!

Catherine
Remington Point PTA

I don't know if this counts, but our Lowe's Toolbox project was centered around the idea of being environmentally responsible -- water conservation, recycled plastic fixtures, native plants, solar powered fountain, melaleuca mulch (a giant invasive tree instead of our native threatened cypress), natural pesticides (cedar), organic weed killers, and natural fertilizers/weed barriers (made from corn gluten).

We'll be buying a manual mower, too, to not require fossil fuels in our maintenance at all.

The closest we came to an 'event' was a ladybug release for pest control the week the garden was finished. We gave away grilled hot dogs and gave each kid a cup of ladybugs to spread around the garden.

We also had it certified as a Wildlife Habitat by NWF.

The focus was on butterflies, but it is an ecologically friendly educational garden.

I also had a lot of ideas for earth day revolving around the garden, but no teachers took advantage. Next year, probably.

If I ever escape being president, this will be my main PTO focus, because I think making early connections to the world around us is the way to help children understand environmental responsibility. Too many kids think that the only 'nature' is in the rainforest or the great barrier reef.

We weaved an Earth Day theme into a fun fair one year. What can I tell you that is helpful?