Grades Of Green

We recently celebrated our SOAR Eco-Innovation Academy students at the third annual Sustain-a-Thon, hosted by Subaru Pacific. With support from our 2024-2025 corporate partners — Northrop Grumman, ECObyRy, West Basin Municipal Water District, ICAN, and Emeco — students had the opportunity to showcase their innovative sustainability plans to industry representatives. Grades of Green partners, board members, students, and their families came together to celebrate the hard work and creativity students have poured into their projects throughout the school year. The SOAR Eco-Innovation Academy is a collaborative, hands-on program that empowers motivated high school students to learn and lead environmental progress in today’s top industries. Students realize environmental potential by working directly with a variety of businesses and their leaders to learn about sustainability issues and develop real world solutions. With mentorship and guidance, students and businesses will collaborate to develop better environmental standards for industries today and for generations to come. We’re excited to announce that we’re expanding access and opportunities for more students to participate in the SOAR program with an online virtual option featuring incredible corporate and industry partners! Stay tuned to be among the first to know when recruitment begins for these exciting new opportunities. 

Colbie Stanek, a sophomore from Chattahoochee High School in Georgia, is making a meaningful impact in her community by taking environmental action! In order to reduce food waste, Colbie launched a Smart Waste Community pilot partnership with Lomi to introduce composting alternatives in neighborhoods where traditional composting is restricted. She also collaborates with the City of Alpharetta to repurpose composted waste for local food production. In addition, Colbie dedicates time each week to clean up her local lake to reduce waste in the environment. As a second year Grades of Green Eco-Leader, she has spoken on how much she values the mentorship and support she has received to turn her ideas into action. Looking ahead, she hopes to implement a food waste reduction program at her school and advocate for policies to protect Georgia’s waterways. Through her work, Colbie is proving that young changemakers like her can drive real, lasting environmental change across the globe.

Ngalim Franklin is a rockstar LAUNCH facilitator based in Cameroon! As Executive Director of his non-profit, The Greens, he is focusing on educating young individuals from schools and football clubs on tire pollution and the utilization of tires as construction materials. One of his projects aimed to construct a 150-meter-long tire embankment to act as a barrier for a football field, leveling the field and preventing erosion. To clear the area for this project, Ngalim and his youth group utilized our LAUNCH Community/Beach Cleanup Eco-Lesson. He organized and mobilized over 600 students, informing them about waste sorting, waste management, and its effects when improperly disposed of.

Grades of Green is working in partnership with the Environmental Protection Agency to support schools in Inglewood with greening their community. Working closely with Inglewood Unified School District, we are working to support improved environmental curriculum, accessible edible gardens, waste diversion, and food rescue. Over the course of the school year, we were excited to work with Kelso Elementary as one of our core schools. This year, we contributed to their afterschool program with outdoor lessons, demonstrated our "Less Waste, More Garden Space!" assembly school-wide, and established proper waste sorting habits with all students. The new Green Team at Kelso now have lunchtime sorting down to a tee. They even made sure their peers sorted waste like pros! Here’s a standout moment from our visit: Josiah, a Kelso student, came up with a creative idea to repurpose used lunch trays into something new! After learning about the term “circular economy” from our team, he couldn’t wait to share his ideas with his teacher and parents. The Kelso campus is closing at the end of this school year, and many students will be relocated to the newly reopened Warren Lane campus for the 2025-2026 school year. Looking ahead, Grades of Green will work with Warren Lane students in the fall to create new green spaces, which may include edible garden beds, trees, a reading bench, and more.