Chancellor Aviles-Ramos Celebrates Sustainability Efforts in Recognition of Earth Day

  • Posted: Tue Apr 22, 2025

NEW YORK – This Earth Day, New York City Public Schools continues to lead the charge to support climate and sustainability initiatives, in terms of our school operations and the educational experiences we provide our students. Today, New York City Public Schools is sharing the latest on sustainability efforts taking place in and around our school buildings.

“This Earth Day, I am so proud to celebrate the wide range of sustainability efforts and education initiatives happening not just today, but every single day in New York City Public Schools. It is our responsibility to nurture in our students an appreciation for the environment and an understanding of how to protect it,” said Schools Chancellor Melissa Aviles-Ramos. “From moving to clean energy for our 1400 buildings, to composting citywide, to our youth climate action events, I’m proud of the work our team, our educators, and our young climate leaders are doing every day to build a greener city.”

ADVANCING SUSTAINABILITY IN OUR SCHOOL OPERATIONS

  • Decarbonizing our buildings: We reduced emissions and increased energy efficiency across our facilities through mechanical and electrical upgrades, including 225 building automations and controls upgrades, over 200 building lighting upgrades, and added 24 new buildings to summer Demand Response program to conserve energy (now in 470 buildings total). 
  • Going solar: We continue to be the largest contributor to the City’s solar goals, reaching 25 total megawatts of clean energy in 119 solar installations across our buildings to date.  
  • Greening our bus fleet: Through April of 2025, New York City school bus vendors have been awarded $174 million for 533 electric school buses through the US EPA’s Clean School Bus Grant Program and the New York State Bus Incentive Program. This builds upon the 180 electric school buses previously awarded through the same programs, tripling the size of the city’s expected electric bus fleet.

SUPPORTING THE NEXT GENERATION OF CLIMATE LEADERS

  • Systemwide action: We launched our second year of Climate Action Days, with four targeted days of schoolwide learning and action around key areas of waste reduction and management, water, energy efficiency, green space/health/wellness, and advocacy.
  • Empowering our students: On May 21 and 22, we will host middle and high school students at the annual Youth Climate Summit, an event co-planned by high school students on the Office of Energy & Sustainability’s Youth Leadership Council.
  • Supporting our teachers: We hosted our Midwinter Climate Institute for over 500 teachers from schools across NYC to learn about integrating climate across subject areas, in collaboration with Teachers College and Climate School at Columbia University, and 42 partner organizations. 
  • Investing in school communities: for our 9th Annual Sustainability Project Grant, we awarded over $1 million dollars to 242 schools, providing funding and material support to complete a school sustainability project, including new school gardens, educational activities, and planning Climate Action Days. 
  • With solar pathways for our students: We offered Solar Career + Technical Education in nearly 20 CTE high schools, training teachers and students to gain specialized hard skills as part of their Engineering, Construction, and/or Electrical Trades course tracks.  

DAY TO DAY SUSTAINABILITY INITIATIVES

  • Reducing impact through Plant Powered Fridays: By implementing significant changes to our menu, we’ve achieved substantial reductions in environmental impacts. The carbon footprint per student dropped by 40%, the water footprint by one-third, and the land footprint by over 50%.
    • The carbon footprint of food purchases decreased by 30 pounds per student (16,000 tons overall), which is equivalent to the impact of recycling 640,000 bags of trash or planting 240,000 trees.
    • The water footprint was reduced by 300 gallons per student (320 million gallons overall), enough to supply 3.5 million people for a year.
    • The land footprint decreased by 300 square feet per student (7,200 acres overall), which is the equivalent of the farmland needed to feed 14,000 people for a year.
  • Minimizing food waste: We implemented a series of initiatives to minimize food waste from cafeterias, including a food donation program and Plastic Free Lunch Days every 3 weeks in all elementary school kitchens to reduce single-use plastic packaging. 
  • Expanding curbside composting citywide: We brought the largest school district curbside composting program citywide, expanding to over 1,700 schools across the city with the Department of Sanitation (DSNY).