When School District 57 decided to go green, it set a gold standard for the rest of B.C.
And soon the district will have the bronze to prove it.
The district's energy-efficient Duchess Park secondary school is the first school in the province to win the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) gold award and in six weeks the district will receive a plaque sent by LEED Canada to commemorate the honour. Once it arrives, the plaque will be hung in a prominent position at the front entrance of the school.
"It was a great team effort, from the contractor [Western Industrial Contractors] to the architect [Hughes Condon Marler] to the school district -- it's one of the most successful projects we've been involved in," said Nino Maletta, SD 57s general manager of property maintenance.
Duchess Park is unquestionably the city's greenest school. It utilizes geothermal heating as a supplemental source that will over time result in significant energy cost savings. The $36 million school also has systems built in to handle storm water management, and automatic controls for heating, cooling and ventilation. Its large abundant windows make use of natural light to create a bright interior and the building is also constructed with low emission materials.
The school's uses an average 100 kilowatt hours of electricity per square metre,significantly less than the average of 260 kilowatt hours per square metre it takes to light up a typical secondary school in the district. That saves the district about $80,000 per year in energy costs.
Since the new Duchess Park opened in March 2010, student absenteeism has noticeably declined, which Duchess principal Steve MacRae attributes to the pride students take in the new school. Improvements are having desired effects in improving the learning environments at other schools as well.
"When you look at College Heights secondary, when we did that (2008) expansion at the front and opened it up so there was more daylight coming in there it just makes a huge difference and the kids feel good about the place," said Maletta.
"That's what you want. It turns into better grades, better students and better citizens."
School maintenance staff and private contractors have been busy since classes ended in June working on capital projects to upgrade school buildings. Working within a budget of about $3.2 million, the projects range from new rubberized gym floor replacements at Foothills and Hart Highlands elementary schools, to lighting upgrades at PGSS, College Heights elementary, cole Lac des Bois, Edgewood, Foothills, Heritage, Highglen, Pinewood, Vanway, and Westwood schools. New boilers have been or will be installed at Blackburn, Glenview, Highland and Mackenzie secondary.
"We do most of the bigger stuff, the heating stuff and things like that in the summer time because they are more disruptive to the classrooms," said Maletta.
Portables are still in use at some schools, although declining enrollments are reducing the need for those additional classrooms. The district's student population in 2011-12 was 12,767, which is expected to drop by 238 students to 12,529 in the 2012-13 school year.
Heritage will have just two portables in use in September, down from three in previous years, while College Heights elementary is down to one portable, with one still on site that won't be used in the coming school year. D.P. Todd secondary will continue using three portables, while Beaverly, Malaspina, Glenview, and Southridge will each have one portable in use starting in September.
