Clean, Green and Healthy Schools Regional Highlights showcases exceptional school environmental health projects within each of EPA’s ten regions.

EPA Region 10 includes Alaska, Oregon, and Washington; and tribes.

On this page:

• 2014
• 2013

2014 Highlights

Taking the Whole School, Whole Community, and Whole Child Approach To Improve Children’s Environmental Health

Cottage Grove, Oregon: London School (above) and representatives of the Mercury, the Community and Me team (right) visiting the school for the first time in December 2013.In EPA Region 10, the Whole School, Whole Community, Whole Child (WSCC) model is a guiding framework for the work the region does to advance children’s environmental health. WSCC is a collaborative and holistic approach to improving children’s health and education, addressing the cognitive, physical, social, and emotional aspects of development.

Building local and state partnerships is a key strategy Region 10 uses to incorporate the WSCC model into its work. London School, a public school serving about 100 kindergarten through eighth-grade students, is located in Cottage Grove, Oregon, home to one of Oregon’s largest former mercury mines. Concerned about the impacts of mercury contamination, Laurie Briggs, principal of London School, reached out to Region 10 for innovative, effective ways teachers could help students understand how mercury impacts their health and environment. This led to a collaborative effort between Region 10, London School, the Environmental Health Sciences Center at Oregon State University, and the EPA Office of Superfund Remediation and Technology Innovation. The team was passionate about making the project, Mercury, the Community, and Me, more than just a way for teachers to obtain educational materials and handouts; they wanted to create an interactive tool that is easy for teachers to incorporate into their curriculum and fun for students to use, complete with quizzes, videos, and games.

Mercury, the Community, and Me consists of three sections: Environmental Health, Mercury in the Environment, and Mercury and Human Health. Each section contains modules on a spectrum of related topics, with accompanying activities and information from sources like EPA, the National Institutes of Health, and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The project was completed in September 2014, and will be implemented into London School’s curriculum beginning in the 2015 academic school year. Those who collaborated to produce Mercury, the Community, and Me hope that students will gain an increased knowledge and awareness of mercury issues, a greater sense of precaution, and the ability to teach their families about what they have learned. This web-based tool is a great resource for any school facing mercury concerns. For further information and to view the educational activities, visit the Mercury, the Community, and Me website.Exit

Region 10 also partners with Oregon’s Healthy Kids Learn Better (HKLB) Coalition. This year, the HKLB Coalition team is rallying around a single cause: reducing student absenteeism. Guided by the WSCC model, each partner of the HKLB Coalition contributes its own tool to improve student attendance. From reducing bullying, creating physical activity programs, and promoting better nutrition, the integration of each partner’s input creates a program encompassing all aspects of healthy school environments. Region 10 focused on absenteeism caused by asthma, part of the physical environment component of the WSCC model. They brought to the table their expertise on managing asthma triggers and provided resources like the Sensible Steps webinar and EPA’s Indoor Air Quality Tools for Schools.

Region 10 also pursues direct relationships with schools. Northwest Independent School District (Northwest ISD), Washington’s largest association of private independent schools, reached out to Gretchen Stewart, senior environmental employee of the Community Engagement and Environmental Health Unit in EPA Region 10, for assistance with setting up a presenter for an event. Stewart connected Northwest ISD with an environmental specialist from the Northwest Clean Air Agency to speak on indoor air quality in schools. At the event, she was able to connect with Northwest ISD’s director and other attendees and learned that the district provides online training to its members. As an additional tool to enhance the training, Stewart suggested the district look into the Sensible Steps webinar series. The webinars were so well received by Northwest ISD that it now provides the Sensible Steps webinar series for all facility managers to complete as part of their training. All webinar episodes have been captioned and recorded and are available online as a resource for anyone to use.

2013 Highlights

EPA Region 10 has long focused on trying to reach out to stakeholders for healthy school environments at the local, state and national level. On the local level, EPA Region 10 was invited to participate in the Gervais School District Community Wide Health and Wellness Fair (Gervais, Oregon). The purpose of the Health Fair was to increase health awareness through education and prevention. The fair was a platform to build relationships and share information about environmental influences on school health. Region 10’s Healthy Schools Coordinator, Alanna Conley,  used this event to share information on school siting guidelines, the model school guidance document, steps for reducing asthma triggers, information on integrated pest management, EPA’s SunWise program and waste reduction strategies with parents, teachers, health professionals and community members.

The Rural Alaska Children’s Environmental Health Initiative spans all levels of engagement. Working collaboratively with partners from Tribal communities, state and federal agencies, Tribal consortia and more, the Initiative is a true cross-programmatic workgroup. This network, started in 2010, focuses on increasing environmental and public health capacity to protect children from illness and injury through upstream prevention of harmful environmental exposures. Alaska Native children suffer a disproportionate rate of serious and oftentimes preventable illnesses and injuries, including a high burden of acute and chronic respiratory disease. The workgroup, which has representation from over 30 different agencies and communities, has worked with EPA Region 10 to provide technical training for facilities staff, teachers and school nurses across the state. In addition, the group designed a comprehensive assessment tool developed for and distributed to rural Alaska schools and members of the workgroup. By taking existing EPA Schools resources and tailoring them to issues most often seen in rural Alaska (such as heavy amounts of snowfall), the assessment tool can be used for school walkthroughs or by environmental or public health agencies to identify issues for schools in their community.

Region 10 has also used their electronic newsletter “Healthy School News” and the Sensible Steps webinar series to reach stakeholders throughout the nation. The newsletter, which reaches over 8,000 school administrators, nurses, facility managers and other staff, helps to keep school stakeholders abreast of new information such as upcoming conferences, grant opportunities and activities. Recent issues have addressed topics such as school gardens and green cleaning in the classrooms. The Sensible Steps webinar series, a collaboration with EPA Region 8 and EPA national program offices, has reached an impressive audience of school facility managers and personnel and provided greater technical assistance on the topics addressed in the Sensible Steps guide.