|
|
|
Last Updated: Feb 6, 2017 - 2:32:04 PM |
esse Baker, PhD builds an aquaponics system with the help of Grade 5 Students at Lyford Cay International School
|
Nassau, Bahamas -
As part of their 50th Anniversary Speaker Series,
Lyford Cay International School (LCIS) invited sustainability expert,
social entrepreneur and humanitarian, Jesse Baker PhD, and his partner,
Chrissy Gray, to teach students about sustainability. “Our efforts
are meant to (re)define sustainability in more comprehensive terms,
and to inspire individuals to take action in their everyday lives,”
said Baker.
Baker and Gray founded a non-profit organization in California to
develop various projects that promote an ethic of "sustainability."
Baker and Gray believe that sustainability has become overly focused
on the
industries of cutting
carbon emissions and energy savings. “These are important components
of sustainability, but far short of the complete picture,” said Baker
when addressing grade 11 students of LCIS. “ Far too often, social
issues are left out of the picture, and the importance of individual
action is vastly under addressed.” He shared his experiences in Latin
America, Antarctica, and Haiti reminding them that we are all linked
because we all share the same planet. “ Don’t wait for the big corporations
or governments to change the way they are treating the environment,
“ he told students, ”become ‘agents of change’ and try to take
small steps to living more sustainably.”
During the week that Baker and Gray spent in Nassau they spent a lot
of time with the students at LCIS, whether during formal talks and presentations
or over lunch in the school library. The conversations were remarkably
varied, ranging from instructions on how to care for the school’s
newly built aquaponics outdoor classroom, to the possibility of LCIS
students taking part in humanitarian trips to Haiti. Students, teachers,
administrators and parents all had opportunities to meet with the pair
and discuss their ideas on sustainability and how LCIS, as a school,
could become more sustainable.
The topic was a timely one as LCIS embarks on the first steps of achieving
Green Flag School Status. Baker and Gray, with the help of LCIS students,
built The Aquaponics Outdoor Classroom on the campus, and used it to
engage students in conversations about the environmental impact of most
food production industries.
Students learned that aquaponics was a sustainable method of food
production because it did not use fertilizers, used very little electricity,
recycled water, required no soil in which to grow plants, produced plants
at a faster rate than traditional farming and also provided fresh fish
as a food source. During his conversations with the students, Baker
told students about his visits to Haiti to distribute portable water
filtration systems to the often forgotten people living in rural areas.
“We needed to get them an efficient way of filtering their water because
they were in the middle of a cholera outbreak,” explained Baker. The
water filtration project in Haiti led into an aquaponics project. “The
challenge was to help the Haitian people gain access to fresh water
and healthy food in a country where there is very high pollution of
water sources and very little soil for growing food. And Aquaponics
was the answer, fresh food in plant form as well as fresh fish!” Within
the modular system, fish are raised symbiotically with plant production
through a closed system that uses 90% less water than regular agriculture.
The Aquaponics system built at LCIS is much the same as the systems
installed in Haiti. Essentially, there is a tank containing fish which
produce waste. Water, carrying the fish waste, is pumped from the tank
into a series of water channels that contain edible plants situated
in porous baskets. The plants roots are anchored in a clay ball growing
medium that gives the roots somewhere to adhere too and eliminates the
need for soil. The nutrient rich water feeds the roots of the plants
as it passes through the channels. The plants roots also filter the
water so that eventually clean water falls back into the fish tank below,
where it begins it cycle all over again. Aquaponics uses 90% less water
than traditional farming and no added fertilizers. The system at LCIS
will be used to teach much more that sustainability, it is also a wonderful
tool for teaching math, biology, history, civic engagement and it could
also be a way to develop another lasting community engagement program
at LCIS. “We are happy to invite other school to visit our Aquaponics
Outdoor Classroom and learn how they can build similar systems on their
campus,” said principal, Stacy Bobo.
© Copyright 2012 by thebahamasweekly.com
Top of Page
|
|
|
|