Turning Off The Lights

When I read in the Ridgewood Patch about how the RHS Students for Environmental Action Club was saving the taxpayers thousands of dollars, I had one of those, "Why didn't we do this when I was young?" moments. Their idea is a simple one, but takes perseverance and good record keeping. Every Friday afternoon as soon as school is over they split up in teams and turn out all the lights in all the classrooms.

According to Victoria Pan, a junior at Ridgewood High School and the co-president of Students for Environmental Action (SEA), an RHS club,

"Turn Off the Lights is a project in which our club turns off all the classroom lights at the end of the week. Every Friday after school, we basically “raid” the school, turning off all the light switches in the classrooms.

We measure our progress by keeping track of all the lights in our school and using charts to monitor their on/off status. At the end of each raid, I compile the results from the students. We continuously examine the monthly electricity bills every few months or so to check for reductions in energy costs. I’ve been consistently running this project every week for more than a year, and so far, it has saved the school thousands of dollars in electricity costs!"

What a brilliant idea! (pun intended).