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2023-2024 Clean Energy Fellows Pacific Northwest Power Grid Cohort

This cohort of educators created unique K-12 STEM programming that leveraged community relationships, regional energy resources, regional energy and justice challenges, and industry expertise, localized to meet the needs of their learning community.

Photo Gallery

Photo of a poster of "Turtle City" a green landmass in roughly the shape of a turtle has many clusters of structures connected by roads around a central pond. Most labels can not be read.
Three bearded men present a table with a model house, construction equipment, school bus, field, and powerlines running the length. The white table cloth says Play It Safe Around Electricity. A
Science Poster titled: Efficiency in agriculture. A pie chart and photos of agriculture practices break up sections of text. The text can not be read in the photo.
Student work example: Title box: Reliability of Green City Microgrid Text box: Our microgrid can function independently off of the main grid through wind and hydroelectric power. This would be necessary when a blackout occurs. Blackouts, or power outages, can be caused by storms, natural disasters, human errors, animals, trees, etc. It is crucial for the green city of I.A.A to have reliable green power sources when these tragedies happen, thus everybody in our community can receive electricity to meet their needs. Image of snap circuit with a fan, and a crank connected to power boards. Text to right: As you can see, if a wire disconnects from the main power source (B4) then one of the two or both green energy sources will start up and power the city. This shows that I.A.A can function independently off of the main grid.
Computer generated graphic of a student town called Exygon (labeled at the top). A wall like building with a pond is at the top next to a black square structure. Below that is a white and brown multi-story building next to a brown building. Then a subdivision with wind turbines and light rail.
A science poster titled: 6 Advanced Robots For Next Gen Farming. Between text sections are photos of different types of agricultural robots. The text can not be read.
Three students hold 2 Kidwind fireflies on top of pencils. their blue propellors are spinning.
Student Example Text: Student Examples - Rationale for their Green City Top Box: Our structure basis for our green city is biogas and solar power. We are eliminating human activities like power plants because all the factories produce carbon dioxide into our atmosphere. Even though we have horses and they produce methane we can use their manure to power our biogas generators. In the gaps of our houses, we have tree patches that absorb carbon dioxide and redirect it as oxygen for our atmosphere. We chose these because we have horses as our transportation and since they poop out methane we will use the methane to power our biogas generators during the day. We also have solar panels because our weather is sunny during the day so we will have our biogas generators going at night for heat and power, and then the solar panels will power the house during the day. Pros and cons of solar power: Pros: sun's light creates energy eco friendly Cons: needs the sun's light to work doesn't always work can take up a lot of space Pros and cons to biogas: Pros: eco friendly uses manure to produce energy Cons: not always - efficient on a big scale Bottom Box: Our focus is on clean energy, using solar and wind power. Solar power is crucial to harness the natural energy of the sun which we receive an abundance of here in our city. Wind power is also essential in our city due to its windy nature. We aim to absorb as much solar and wind energy as possible to reduce our reliance on fossil fuels. These efforts are part of our commitment to reducing the amount of methane and carbon dioxide in our atmosphere. We are dedicated to redirecting our energy usage towards more sustainable and environmentally friendly renewable energy sources. We chose solar power because it is eco-friendly and our latitude provides a lot of sun. It is an expensive system to set up and maintain. We have put solar panels on the roofs of all structures in our city with batteries outside of each structure (which does take space). Wind power is our backup energy source and not as powerful. The wind turbines to take up more space, but also provide jobs for our people so we figured the trade-off was worth it.
A student looks up at a wind turbine while connecting a 9V battery at the base. Other students in the room look at the turbine.

Additional Info

Links

2023-2024 Clean Energy Fellows: Power Grid Cohort Showcase

Collaborative Partners

Benton Public Utility District
Pacific Northwest National Labs
Douglas County Public Utility District
Northern Wasco Public Utility District
Peninsula Power & Light
Gorge STEM Hub
Columbia Gorge Makers Club

Funding Partners

Bonneville Power Administration

Laura Wommack Headshot

“  All of the teachers who participated in my cohort created interesting, unique and engaging curricula for their students. We had the opportunity to network with other like-minded educators and energy professionals and be supported in our journey to create meaningful learning experiences for our students by the supportive and accessible staff at CE- Clean Energy. Bright Futures.“

Laura Wommack

2023-2024 Clean Energy Fellow, PNW Power Grid Cohort, Mansfield WA

Meet the Clean Energy Fellows

Sarah Grace Bendinger Headshot
Sarah Grace Bendinger

Mosier Community School, Mosier OR

Sarah-Grace is a 4th and 5th grade teacher at Mosier Community School.

Kirsten Brent Headshot
Kirstin Brent

Harbor Ridge Middle School, Gig Harbor WA

Kirstin Brent has been teaching for 25 years. She really enjoys creating lessons that are tangible for students using the design engineering process. She love the outdoors, especially hiking and swimming. Through teaching, Kirstin wants to empower her students to become sustainable consumers and producers of energy to create a better world for all.

Scott McComb Headshot
Scott McComb

Raisbeck Aviation High School, Tukwila WA

Over his nearly 20 years living and teaching in Seattle, Scott has served as a teacher, curriculum author, project-based learning leader and coach, codeveloper of the school’s mentor program, department head, administrator, founder and faculty advisor to Science Olympiad, Green Energy, and American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics teams, etc. In each aspect of my work, he puts students in roles where they are agents of their own futures, whether they are designing heat shields to protect chocolate bunnies from the heat of re-entry (the results of which they present to practicing thermal protection system engineers), designing solar-powered, high-torque simulated Martian rovers, designing and launching experiments to the edge of space aboard high-altitude balloons, or racing full-sized solar-powered cars at the National Solar Car Challenge (national champions in 2019 and 2021). He is proud of his part helping to make RAHS one of the premier schools in Washington and grateful to have been honored for those contributions (National Aviation Hall of Fame 2019; AIAA Educator Achievement 2020; National Coalition for Aviation and Space Education 2020).

Jamie Whitney Headshot
Jamie Whitney

Kamiakin High School, Kennewick WA

Jamie has been a science teacher for 20 years, believes that developing student understanding of science concepts creates well-informed voters, policy makers, and drives creative problem solving. In addition to serving on the Kennewick School District Curriculum Advisory Committee, she is also involved in the National Science Leadership Network through ESD 123. Recently, Jamie worked with her district and Pacific Northwest National Lab to develop curriculum around salmon and dams, and presented professional development on this curriculum.

Laura Wommack Headshot
Laura Womack

Mansfield High School, Mansfield WA

Laura is a middle and high school science teacher at the Mansfield School District. She is passionate about Agriculture Science and the transition towards sustainable farming practices. She works on ways to integrate clean energy topics into agriculture lessons for her students. Laura is also the District 3 Representative for the Washington Association of Science Teachers.