District’s Green Ribbon School Project receives grant award

November 15, 2012

SCA, a global hygiene and forest products company, has awarded an educational grant in the amount of $2,500 to Schuylerville’s Green Ribbon School Project and Hudson Crossing Park. The joint award, given on America Recycles Day (November 15), will be used to build on successful projects that were started on the school district campus during the inaugural year of the Green Ribbon School (GRS) Project. With the funding, volunteers will complete a butterfly garden and an outdoor classroom. Also, the district’s recycling program will be expanded and a composting project will begin.

SCA Regional Director Michael Mound (left) gives a ceremonial check to Cindy Wian, Hudson Crossing Park's vice president of education and a Schuylerville Green Ribbon School volunteer, and Schuylerville Elementary School Principal Gregg Barthelmas.   Green Ribbon School volunteer Deborah McGloine "plants" a marker in the SCA stone garden to acknowledge receipt of an SCA environmental grant award.

During the award ceremony at the SCA plant in Greenwich, SCA Regional Director Michael Mound presented a ceremonial check and an engraved stone/commemorative marker to Green Ribbon School and Hudson Crossing Park volunteers and Schuylerville School District Representatives. The marker was “planted” in a newly created stone garden that honors all the regional environmental grant recipients from the past five years.

Schuylerville Elementary School Principal Gregg Barthelmas thanked SCA and the community volunteers for their support and the ongoing activities that benefit students. “We appreciate the support from a local business partner as we expand environmental programs and initiatives in the district,” he said. “I’d be remiss if I didn’t acknowledge the efforts of our Green Ribbon School team, especially Deborah McGloine, Cindy Wian, Betty Gifford and Angela Meislin. This small group of volunteers has made a huge impact on the district in a very short period of time. Their dedication and drive to promote green initiatives is creating an environmental awareness in the district, changing mindsets and helping to improve the health of the community. With grant funding from SCA, the positive impacts will only grow.”

Cindy Wian, vice president of education for Hudson Crossing Park and a Green Ribbon School Project volunteer, echoed the thanks and appreciation. “With support from SCA, we can grow this project even bigger…the stewards who are now volunteers dedicating countless hours to creating and caring for community parks like Hudson Crossing started out as tree climbers and tulip planters. The innovators who are inventing new ways to recycle and re-use paper fiber started as kids who wrapped gifts in old artwork. The conservationists who steadfastly champion the importance of caring for our natural resources—clean air, clean water, fertile soil—were once little butterfly catchers and birdwatchers. Thanks to this SCA grant, we know that Schuylerville Schools, together with the Green Ribbon School team and Hudson Crossing Park, are growing these critical leaders of tomorrow,” Wian said.

SCA has awarded nearly $170,000 in environmental education grants to 80 schools and non-profit organizations in the U.S. communities where it has operations, including more than $47,000 to schools in upstate New York.

“We intend for the stone gardens at our Greenwich and South Glens Falls facilities to serve as visible reminders of SCA’s commitment to sustainability and of our support for fostering an early passion for the environment in our schools,” Mound said.