Pictured above, fifth grade students Tara Rice and Kylie Wolfe, of Fairbanks Elementary School, placed in a logo designing competition through the Ohio Energy Project’s Be E3 Smart program. Rice won second place and Wolfe received an honorable mention. Both of them, along with their teacher, Tina Hall, who also received an award for “outstanding achievement in energy education, went to COSI Columbus to an awards ceremony on May 16. Pictured above are, from left to right, Kylie Wolfe, Sue Gibson, director of communications for Union Rural Electric, and Tara Rice; and pictured below, are Fairbanks Elementary School principal Mark Lotycz and fifth grade teacher Tina Hall. (Photos submitted)
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A Fairbanks Elementary School teacher and two of her students were recognized for their work in energy science education during the school year.
Teacher Tina Hall and her students, Tara Rice and Kylie Wolfe, attended an energy celebration banquet at COSI Columbus. Hall accepted an award for “outstanding achievement in energy education” and Rice and Wolfe received second place and honorable mention, respectively, for designing shirt logos. Hall teaches the program and said it has had many practical applications in her students’ lives.
“I will absolutely continue with the Ohio Energy Project (OEP),” she said. “The big scale of why we’re doing this (involves teaching) some lifelong lessons to (my students).”
She said the logos made by Rice and Wolfe will be used on shirts, kits, sling bags and other materials for the OEP’s Be E3 Smart program. She said, through this program, she’s incorporated it into her lesson plans, and her students often bring their newfound energy efficiency knowledge to their parents.
“The kids get materials to take home and install in their homes,” she said. “We’ll do an experiment here, they follow up with some activities at home and things we get the parents involved with and understanding what we’re doing… The home-school connection with the materials is wonderful.”
Hall said she regularly attends conferences through the Ohio Energy Project in the summer, as it gives her new materials and additions to her curriculum for when she teaches her science class during the new school year. With this curriculum comes a focus on physical sciences, which she said ranges from learning how electricity powers lightbulbs to how a hot water heater works.
The OEP, created in 1984, is an initiative that provides educational materials and ideas to teachers and students. Through its Be E3 Smart program, OEP has distributed energy-efficiency packages — which are comprised of LED lightbulbs, showerheads and other materials that encourage energy efficiency — to teachers who participate in the program.
Be E3 Smart is sponsored by electric cooperatives, such as Union Rural Electric (URE), and teachers volunteer to be a part of the program. The program is open to all teachers in Ohio.
Sue Gibson, director of communications for URE, said URE sponsored Hall to go through classes as its representative and the goal is to recruit two teachers in the area to participate in the program.
“Tina Hall has been with the program for a number of years,” Gibson said. “She’s outstanding with what she does with her kids in this program.”
She said the Be E3 Smart program has many activities that engage students in, and it doesn’t conclude with just shirt logo competitions, and it spans among all grades. She said Hall’s students competed in the fifth to seventh grade division.
Gibson said electric cooperatives are looking for teachers to sign-up for the program, and are always looking to sponsor new recruits.