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 Campaigns > Statewide Pilot Programs > New Jersey
New Jersey
In 2006, CHEJ launched a pilot project partnering with GreenFaith, a New Jersey statewide interreligious coalition for the environment, to equip students in faith-based schools with environmental leadership skills through our Green Flag Schools Program. Student teams identify problems and then work with administrators to create, pass and implement environmental policies and programs that improve indoor air quality, eliminate the use of toxic pesticides and cleaning products, and/or increase recycling rates and energy conservation.
Faith-based schools are the strategically chosen target for this national pilot effort. Their moral perspective lends itself to the ethical values associated with environmental health issues, and their positions resonate powerfully with policy makers and the media. Together, GreenFaith and CHEJ have been able to integrate ethical themes suitable for a diverse religious audience into all the project materials, the first time such materials have been created anywhere in the US. We are working with schools of diverse religious traditions, including Jewish, Catholic, and Muslim.
In the first year, CHEJ recruited six schools to participate in the pilot phase of this project, held school-wide assemblies, awarding each school their Green Flag, established and trained teams of students, teachers and administrators, and helped them set goals, plan their strategy, communicate with their wider school community, and earn a patch for their flag in at least one project area.
Beginning in September 2007, we will expand the project to include more schools, and share what we’ve learned with many more schools statewide through media outreach and training programs. We will also network faith-based schools together in advocacy efforts to replicate in New Jersey measures that are already protecting students’ health in schools in other states, such as eliminating exposure to diesel bus exhaust and phasing out toxic cleaning products.
> See other local grassroots work in New Jersey.
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