2018-2019 YES! Teams
If you want to join this great network of YES! teams for the 2018-2019 season, contact us at sayyes@yesmn.org
Carlton
- Exploring the possibility of retrofitting some older light bulbs in their school with new LED bulbs
- Investigating light sensors to turn lights off lights when no one is in a classroom
- Working to switch from plastic to reusable, metal silverware
- Researching a local lake restoration project
Discovery Woods Montessori
- Exploring “Where does our garbage go?”
- Planning the annual environmental event
- Plan to help the “littles” sort their garbage in the lunch room
- Researching which water bodies are in greatest need of clean up, monitoring and testing for AIS.
- Designing and building rain gardens for school
DREAM Technical Academy
- Water quality project for Willmar Lake
- Pollinator Planting
- Working to determine more projects for this year!
Forest Lake
- Storm drain stencil project: 6 students stenciled 15 drains in Lakeside Park, Forest Lake. The stencil read, “Dump No Waste; Drains to Lake”
- Holiday lights collection for recycling
- Submission of Green Ribbon School application
- Environmental movie and educational night set for January 18th
- Youth Convening Minnesota
- Pollinator/Rain Garden
Glencoe-Silver Lake
- Building a SuperMileage vehicle which teaches how to maximize gas engine efficiency and reducing emissions
Lac qui Parle Valley
- Continuing to plant and harvest in their deep winter green house
- Trying to figure out how to capture and store rain water to water their plants with in the winter
Mankato West
- Running the numbers for a potential LED lighting retrofit for the school
- Collecting water data from the local watershed in Rasmussen Woods
Minnetonka (New Team)
- Designing and constructing an early season, low energy use green house
- Designing and constructing a small scale aquaponics station for growing lettuce and basil all winter long
- Demonstrate to home owners and renters how to grow starter plants and seasonal crops at the local scale
Moorhead – Youth Educational Services
- Working to formulate projects for this year
New London-Spicer Middle School
- Continuing to plant and harvest in their deep winter green house where greens get served at lunch
- Raising money to purchase LED light bulbs for their school
- Going to assist the HS team with the native plantings and rain garden
- Participating in Aquatic Invasive Species surveying and education
New London-Spicer High School
- Planning to design and construct a rain garden with native plantings near their wetland area in order to help with erosion and runoff issues
- Raising money to purchase LED bulbs from the exterior lighting at their school
- Participating in Aquatic Invasive Species surveying and education
New Prague
- Installing a hydration station
- Water testing in the school and DIY filters for sinks
- Building playscapes at Ney Nature Center and continuing volunteering
- Up-cycling wood pallets
- Agriscaping design at school and Farmhouse Market
- Hosting Community Green Day
- Growing food using an aquaponics system with tilapia, sucker fish, and gold fish
- Growing food in a living tower system
- Creating signage for their rain garden and pollinator garden
- Building 3 raised garden beds
- Making natural products and looking at the benefits
- Created a team Instagram account on which they share “Water Fact Wednesdays”
Northern Lights Community School
- Implementing a water hydration station
- Educating their peers about water topics
- Tracking water usage in their schools
Parkers Prairie (New Team)
- Researching water quality improvement projects for local Lake Adly
- Researching school site pollinator garden collaboration with Art Department
- Exploring composting
- Designing and building a native garden to control run off
ROCORI (Cold Spring/Richmond)
- Installing a solar panel for their school courtyard
- Continuing school wide recycling
Royalton
- Researching how to design and build an electronic bike
- Researching doing a river clean-up next spring
- Exploring water quality testing options and connecting with local water quality/conservation experts
Sartell-St. Stephen Middle School
- Creating peer educational lessons on water quality and aquatic invasive species
- Learning about the Little Rock Lake drawdown
- Looking at adding a hydration station
- Continue waste reduction at their school
Sleepy Eye (Public and St. Mary’s)
- Creating signage for their prairie restoration project
- Lights in Motion
- Getting the word out about LED light bulbs while distributing them to the community
- Recycling holiday lights
- Minnesota Valley River Watch
- Recycling milk cartons
- B3 Benchmarking all the buildings in Sleepy Eye that the city owns
- Designing a recycling sign that RVS Trucks with put on the side of their waste pick-up trucks
- Building 8 bee homes
Springfield
- Continuing to plant and harvest in their deep winter green house. The greens get served at school lunch
- Working with aquaponics in the greenhouse and making it more efficient
- Holiday light recycling
- Adopt-a-Highway
- Pop tab collection
Westbrook-Walnut Grove
- Recycling education at sports events
- Educating the community about recycling
- Writing newspaper articles and putting it on their website
- Having the community come up with ideas and beautify the container for all the cans
- Holiday light recycling
- Work in the greenhouse with the greenhouse class
- Key recycling
- Creating a water storage system to collect rain water from the roof of the bus garage to water the school garden
- Planning and creating a rain garden at their school
Wrenshall
- Working on their supermileage vehicle
- Hoping to create a solar boat for the solar boat regatta this year
- Plan to present their vehicle and boat at various events in their school and community
Yellow Medicine East
- Installing another hydration station
- Planting and harvesting in their community garden
- Brainstorming water collection and storage methods for their community orchard
“It feels good to make a difference in the environment and bringing positive changes to our school.” –St. Cloud North Junior High YES! Student
