EDMONTON – Students and staff at Edmonton’s Queen Elizabeth High School were honoured at a surprise assembly Tuesday when they learned they are the first of 10 winners of this year’s national Superpower Your School contest, an initiative put together by Earth Day Canada and Staples Canada.
The award means the school will receive $25,000 which will be used to equip the school’s INNOVATE Energy Lab with the latest in modern technology and to create a more collaborative workspace.
The north Edmonton school was given the award because it emphasizes environmental education through INNOVATE, its project-based program that combines curriculums with community engagement and research opportunities for students. It allows students to tackle sustainable development challenges while also earning credits for doing so.
Environmental education has been a fixture at the school since 2010 and since then, the program has yielded results like installing smart metres to measure and reduce energy, building solar lanterns as well as tree-planting initiatives.
In 2015, Queen Elizabeth High School was recognized as the greenest school in Canada by the Canada Green Building Council.