Susy Ellison, 2010 Bartlett Award Winner

Susy Ellison is a teacher at Yampah Mountain High School, not your typical “green school.” The average student at this alternative high school in Glenwood Springs, Colo. has not been successful in a traditional high school, for a variety of reasons. Many are teen parents. Others have emotional disabilities or special education needs, read below grade-level, or are otherwise considered “at-risk.”

But that hasn’t deterred Ellison from sharing her passion for the environment with her students, nor has it stopped them from achieving results.

“As a child, I was given opportunities and experiences that helped develop my passion for the environment,” Ellison said. “Now, many years later, I work to instill that same sense of scientific evaluation, environmental wonder, understanding and activism in my students.”

Ellison is the winner of the 2010 Richard C. Bartlett Environmental Education Award, an honor given annually by the National Environmental Education Foundation to an outstanding educator who has successfully brought environmental learning into the classroom.

Ellison’s many successes “greening” Yampah Mountain High School include the installation of a student-designed photovoltaic system, construction of a geodesic dome greenhouse, creation of a 500 square-foot sustainable straw bale classroom and installation of a weather station at the school, as well as the coordination of an energy audit of the building leading to a retrofitting project. A tireless fundraiser and self-proclaimed “schmoozer,” Ellison has secured nearly $200,000 in grants and awards to implement projects.

The sustainability projects have not only made Yampah Mountain greener; they have engaged troubled or under-achieving students in project-based learning with results they could be proud of. A former student of Ellison’s now working to educate the public about the merits of solar energy believes these varied projects “empower students not only to learn, but also to make choices that positively impact the environment.”

While these achievements are great, perhaps the more powerful result of Ellison’s effort is an integrated environmental curriculum at Yampah Mountain. Cross-curricular teaching teams focus on a particular environmental theme and incorporate the topic into science, math, language arts and social studies lessons for an entire school year. Recent topics have included food and sustainability and population growth. A math teacher may use population growth data to help students master graphing skills, while a social studies class discusses the impact of growth on the geographic distribution of populations and a science class focuses on limiting factors in an ecosystem. Using a unifying theme to break the silos found in a typical high school curriculum enables students to become experts in the topic at hand while helping them to experience the way problems are solved in a “real world” setting. “Green” teaching is no longer just for the science lab.

Add to Ellison’s innovative instructional methods and greening of the school building her ability to create memorable experiences for her students – from a trip to Washington, D.C. for the annual solar decathlon to a flyover of local oil and gas project sites as part of students’ work on alternative energy. According to one former student, in Ellison’s classroom, “life experiences become educational opportunities.” Many of her students have pursued degrees and careers in the sciences or with nonprofit environmental organizations.

Featured many times in the local Glenwood Springs Post Independent, Ellison was recently quoted summing up how her environmental initiatives are compatible with Yampah Mountain High School’s philosophy for educating at-risk youth: “It’s about relevance and personal responsibility. And there is nothing, in my opinion, more relevant than being part of your environment and being responsible for it.”