As a Renewable School project, Grace Lutheran School is building a dedicated community of renewable energy educators, generating clean energy through their awarded 1.1-kilowatt photovoltaic (PV) system and leveraging the system as an educational tool to bring energy topics to life in their classrooms.
The system was installed on the school roof in clear view of thousands of cars that pass each day. The pre-kindergarten to 8th-grade school incorporated the live system performance data into several educational experiences, including newspaper reporting on the project, a website profile and community science days. Energy monitoring provided to the school initially connected the live performance data from their PV system to the Energy Exploration Center at Solar4RSchools.org. The school also displayed the PV system's performance data onto its 52' plasma screen announcement board located in the front entry.
In 2009, educators within the school received a customized renewable energy teacher training, hands-on science kit materials to augment the school's existing curricula, and complete access to the resources available on the Solar4RSchools.org website.