Staff Writer

Nancy Naimey’s second grade class wrote a song about recycling.

Sung to the tune of “Down” by Jay Shawn, the “green” song gives tips on how to keep the environment clean by planting trees, using both sides of paper and not polluting the ocean.

Soon the students will have something else to sing about: solar panels on Consolidated School’s roof.

Naimey heads the Go Green committee at the Kennebunkport school that has helped bring changes to the curriculum and structure of the building.

The committee, made up of parents, teachers and other community members, reached its goal last week to install approximately 25 solar panels to save electricity and reduce its carbon footprint.

Students were able to raise $21,000 from donations and fundraisers. The amount was matched by Naoto and Susan Inoue, owners of the Solar Market in Arundel, grandparents of current Consolidated students and the parents of alumni. The money was used to purchase the panels.

Solar Market designs and installs a variety of renewable energy systems, including the school’s new solar panels.

 Naimey said the solar panels could also be moved to the top of another school. Harriman Associates currently is looking at all of the district’s school buildings as part of a facilities study.  While no decisions will be made until the end of the study, one option the district has discussed to save money is closing one or more of the schools.

With the panels online, the committee has moved on to its next project. This week students began putting bare-root plants on the top roof of an outdoor classroom to create a living roof of blue fescue grass and sedum plants.

The outdoor classroom is a small wooden structure with open walls and a flat roof with beams for the plants to grow between.  The top of the roof will have sod so the dirt will not fall through the roof, but allow the roots of the plants to grow through.

Another parent is donating time to build a walkway to the classroom while a student’s grandfather is building benches next to the school’s greenhouse.

“If it wasn’t for the people it wouldn’t have gotten done,” Naimey said.

Inside the building, students from kindergarten to fifth grade are learning how to live more environmentally friendly lives.

First-grade students learn the “three Rs”: reduce, reuse, recycle. Fourth-graders are learning about natural recycling, such  as composting with worms and fifth-graders are learning about energy by building Lego houses and using windmills to power them.

“The kids are beginning to teach each other. The whole climate (of the school) is really green,” Naimey said.

The committee raises its funds privately, without financial support from the school district, Naimey said.

Consolidated School is planning an open house in June for the public to tour the new facilities and learn more about its green initiatives.

Staff Writer Suzanne Hodgson can be reached at 282-4337, ext. 233.