Partnering with Grand Aspirations for their Summer of Solutions program, YEA Corps embarked on their first class of Sustainable Education Interns. 15 students began working with YEA Corps in June of 2011 and will graduate in August, 2011 with a certificate recognizing their completion of the program.

SEIC is designed similar to YEA Corps’ mission, emphasizing sustainability and entrepreneurship as the core basis of the program. Students, varying in school coursework and sustainable working-experience, are matched to projects and volunteer board members based on their skill sets and interests. This year’s SEIC class is working on YEA Corps’ flagship sustainable projects: aquaponics, vermacompositing and the cultivation of mushrooms, each intern bringing their own piece to each project. Interns are specializing in all facets of the organization: business and grant writing; research and education development; technology and sustainable development as well as marketing and social media.

“The Sustainable Education Internship Center is far exceeding any expectation I ever had,” said Mary Helen Franze, Executive Director of YEA Corps. “Students are energetic, hard-working and innovative. SEIC creates a larger capacity for YEA Corps to educate more youth on sustainable practices while giving interns the opportunity to apply job skills needed to market themselves.” While interns grow and expand the mission of the organization, they’re gaining job preparation skills.

The first class of SEIC will come to a close mid-August in time for YEA Corps’ fundraiser on August 25th. As part of the internship, students were asked to make a video showcasing their experience with YEA Corps and the impact of the organization’s sustainable projects. The video will be featured at the fundraiser.

SEIC is located at 300 Industrial Blvd., Minneapolis, MN 55413 at our high school partner, Minnesota Internship Center Charter High School’s East site. We look forward to working with their students in the Fall.

About YEA Corps
YEA Corps, Young Enterprising Agents, is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization, specializing in sustainable educational projects in the classroom. Partnering with Minnesota Internship Center (MNIC), hands-on sustainable labs are implemented into student curriculum, continuing YEA Corps’ mission: “Enterprising programs that empower youth with job skills and sustainable education.” Additional information about YEA Corps can be found online at www.yeacorps.org.

About Grand Aspirations: Summer of Solutions
Summer of Solutions is a volunteer-based program, partnering participants with community projects focused on sustainability. For additional information about Grand Aspiration and the Summer of Solutions program visit www.grandaspirations.org.

About Minnesota Internship Center (MNIC)
The Minnesota Internship Center High School is open to all students, with a concentration on students needing an alternative to traditional high schools. MNIC is built on the principal of a small learning community. Curriculum is focused on job preparation, career exploration and life skills. For additional information visit www.mnic.org.

My niche is mushrooms.  Other interns are working on maintaining the aquaponics system and looking into ways to improve it.  We have an algae specialist, photosynthesis specialist,  system productivity specialist, and composting specialist.  There are interns writing grants, documenting our work on video, and creating and refining curriculum.  We’re a group with a variety of interests and skills who have come together to change the way education and sustainability are viewed.  We’re preparing ourselves and others with the skills to create meaningful jobs.   There’s definitely something special going on here.

Andi Thone, YEA Corps Intern

The school year at the Minnesota Internship Center Charter School (MNIC) is just concluding, as is the first science class program partnership between MNIC and YEA Corps.  The MNIC campus’ were abuzz with the exciting news of growing fish, plants, and fungi on site!

This past year year, especially the second semester, had its share of drama and exciting moments, just as you would experience once you get out in the ‘real world.’ Amongst a dreadfully slow spring onset, the students witnessed the power of an outdoor hoop house micro environment that allowed their plants from the previous season to germinate while still snow covered outside ground! While indoors, the tomato and basil plants grew so quickly that 3 weeks ago the students had to transplant and move them into their garden outside.  The plants had outgrown our UV-mimicking HPS lighting system.  Our successful growth is the result of a properly maintained and designed aquaponics system.  The students have now re-seeded the planting tanks with watercress to continue the acquaponics life circle.  In the last week of the spring semester, the students’ shiitake mushrooms EXPLODED in growth after weeks of speculation and wonder if they would ever fruit.  It was a glorious reward for patient and proper care.

As in real life, not every day brings sunshine.  Setbacks do occur.  A few of the students discovered that their tomato plants had been infected with something as they were being transferred to the garden.  And some of our mushrooms began to sport a curious fuzz, suspected to be a type of fungal infection.  Theories that both were fungal infections and deductive reasoning based on the occurrence of the infections at only one of the two sites, led the students to conclude that the ventilation in the basement class room site, mixed with a high moisture level was the cause of these infections.  Probably the most reported incident was the infamous death of one of our tilapia fish.  During a temporary move from one tank to another, one fish tried to make a dash for it and ended up with fatal injuries from its plunge to the floor.  Since Mr. Briggs was in charge of the transfer, the students decided to pin the death on him and wrote him up in the monthly student newspaper.

All in all, the program was a great learning experience for the students and a successful start of a hands-on, interactive, and integrated curriculum. This partnership and YEA Corps program is poised for major growth in the 2011-2012 school year.

Stay tuned for Summer and Fall program opportunities, announcements, and more!

Zach

Mr. Briggs’ science class was very excited as the fish arrived and everyone ran to greet them. Preparations were in action with students washing hydroponics rocks (the round red rocks in the plant beds on top of the fish tank in these pictures). The seedlings and starter plants are being added soon. Everything needs to be clean and sterile as we don’t want our human bacteria in these ecosystems. Each student named their fish, and will have to move their minds from caring for them as pets to eating them for sustained nutrition. That won’t be easy and is part of the learning. I noticed that the fish grew within one week!

Brandon Pitcher, YEA Corps’ sustainable consultant and mushroom expert, was visited Friday March 25 and helped with the mushroom preparation. He shared his knowledge of the 5 kingdoms and the students were fascinated! The students prepared a substrate of cleaned coffee grounds and filters in a bucket drilled with holes for venting. The mushroom spores came in a compact cube of sawdust that was inside a compostable cardboard box that had seeds in the side and could be plated to grow a tree. Porsha loved this, and looks forward to planting a tree. The spores were carefully loosened from the sawdust cube and added to the substrate along with the remaining sawdust (everything is used) to grow oyster mushrooms. The most important thing to maintain in this ecosystem is the humidity, and they get quite thirsty! The students are on it and will keep up on watering the little darlings as they watch to see the mushrooms grow off the coffee ground substrate. Keep checking back to see our food as it grows, and hear about all the changes the students are observing and recording. This is an amazing and exciting hands-on way to learn about scientific ecosystems, research, data collection, biology, cause and affect, nutritious eating. The learning is expediential!

Until then, be good. Ms. Helen

Who knew learning could be so much fun! With YEA Corps’ Sustainable Program students are always learning with hands on experiences which always motivates the students to go to school, how great is that?

Until next time, be good, Ms Helen

YEA Corps shares Brandon’s enthusiasm for the ‘blue economy’. His workshop on the 5 Kingdoms and ZERI organization, has sparked a flame into our organization and our new zero-waste systems we are creating, growing, and maintaining at MNIC. He is consulting us on our Mushroom project to help us maintain a proper ecosystem. Additionally, Brandon will bring his advice to our Algae growing system. Algae have a multitude of functions for sustainability and we are excited to include it as one of our systems in our Sustainability Program we are teaching the students at MNIC. A shout out of thanks goes to Brandon for his partnership, commitment to sustainability, and wise council to our YEA Corps. We look forward to a fruitful partnership.

A little about Brandon: “Brandon has been a leading change agent in the Midwest for nearly a decade and was recently commended in 2010 with the Indiana Green Business Awards “Green Entrepreneur of the Year” as well as being recognized by Sen. Lugar’s office as an “Energy Patriot” for his dedication to social entrepreneurship and sustainability education over the past decade. His passion for change management and sustainability started at an early age, having given his first lecture on sustainability at Purdue University (a school he did not attend) when he was 20 years old. He has given over 300 presentations across Indiana, throughout the US, and internationally. He has presented at MIT, the United Nations University in Tokyo and many other prominent venues on his work in Indiana, sustainability and zero emissions efforts. He is currently working with a variety of organizations from businesses to civil society throughout the Midwest educating their stakeholders for the opportunities within the current economic transition.”  Read More on Resources.

Pictures of our fish growing are coming up in the next couple of weeks be sure to check them out. After that we will have pictures of aquariums filled with algae and mushrooms growing- How fun is that?! Until then…be good.

-Ms. Helen

Mr. Pitcher is a certified Zero Emissions Research & Initiatives (ZERI), Systems Designer with over 8 years of diverse global experience in sustainability outreach & education, zero emissions & waste consulting, and sustainable redevelopment. Recognizing the importance of education, he is an adamant and passionate advocate for exposing all to the opportunities ahead within sustainability.

Brandon has studied extensively the best practices around the globe for over a decade. He has visited and supported dozens of global projects in over 30 countries while learning from hundreds of scientists, entrepreneurs, activists, policymakers, educators, and community leaders in the industry gaining a vast working knowledge of dozens of projects and the underlying principles of their operations.

He has been the subject of numerous radio shows, TV spots, and newspaper and magazine articles in central Indiana and internationally. From a fluent understanding of numerous sustainability practices and theories and to becoming a certified ZERI practitioner in the United States, Brandon is always on the edge and is working adamantly towards changing the paradigm for development and education in the 21st century.