State website features Byron-Bergen student project

Some students from Byron-Bergen High School spent several weeks last spring learning about civic responsibility in emergencies, including natural and man-made disasters. Their project, "The Science of Safety," is featured on the New York State Service Learning Leadership Institute webpage.

Students were given the responsibility to provide an instructional program during the district's annual Senior Citizens' Day. Using a PowerPoint presentation they developed, handouts from community agencies such as the American Red Cross and RSVP, and sample items from a home emergency kit, students took turns sharing what they had learned about emergency preparedness with a group of approximately 30 senior citizens from the Byron-Bergen community.

Integrated into the project were academic, service, and character education goals and objectives, and a number of New York State Learning Standards were addressed. Students gained science content and communication and technological skills along the way.

With money from a Finger Lakes Service Learning Institute mini-grant, students purchased emergency preparedness "staples" and gave them away as door prizes.

The project can be viewed at http://www.nysslli.org/FL/ProjectPage3.htm.

October 15, 2006