A nearly 90-year-old youth summer camp nestled in the woods of northern Chippewa County is the classic setting where children have made memories for generations.
And this summer, Camp Nawakwa is getting a makeover, thanks to three Chippewa Falls High School students: Zoey Eckwright, Chloe Johnson and Ellie Crosby. The trio are also known as the “Green Team.”
Their goal was to add 44 solar panels to the camp to make it more energy efficient. The total cost for the project is roughly $50,000. And in May, after winning a storytelling competition in Deerfield, they received funding for the last 20 solar panels they needed.
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“We want them to be there because it’s like a visual representation to everyone at the camp that they’re focused on preserving the camp and the environment,” Crosby told WPR’s “Wisconsin Today.”
The Green Team project is part of Chippewa Falls’ two-year independent study course where students can pursue their passion project related to anything environmental.
These high schoolers wrote at least six grants to help fund the solar panels on Camp Nawakwa, and they won four of them. They also took a 40-hour online course to receive a drone-flying license. That allowed them to direct a thermal drone over the camp and see where energy repairs were most needed.
They’ve even met with local and state politicians including Gov. Tony Evers and U.S. Sen. Tammy Baldwin to advocate for their project. The team recently returned from Washington, D.C. after accepting an award for their project from the National Energy Education Development Project at its annual Youth Energy Conference and Awards ceremony.
This month, the Green Team will start teaching classes at Camp Nawakwa on environmental topics, including renewable energy and wind turbines.
“We realized that no matter how young kids are, they’re very intelligent and can be their own version of environmental activists, which is really cool,” Crosby said.
The solar panels are expected to be installed before the end of this summer and will offset the cost of energy at the camp. Then, the students hope to continue to improve the camp by raising money to better insulate the buildings and add new appliances.
Members of WPR’s “Wisconsin Today” attended SolStock, the solar storytelling event in Deerfield where the Green Team won the last 20 solar panels needed to complete its project.
The Green Team advisor and Chippewa Falls physics teacher Nick Gagnon said they’re lucky to have a school district that was supportive of this type of program.
He pointed to the first Green Team’s successful project, which funded solar panels on Chippewa Falls’ “Hope Village,” a community of 10 tiny homes for people transitioning out of homelessness.
He said the Green Team independent study is clearly deserving of school credit for the students.
“The amount of work and time they put into this is way more than any class that they do. They’re traveling during the week and on the weekends,” he said.
Editor’s note: The Couillard Solar Foundation created this solar panel storytelling contest and put on the 4th annual Solstock festival in Deerfield. The foundation is a business sponsor of Wisconsin Public Radio.
