Forging a Sustainable Future
Educating for Sustainability
Forging a more sustainable future is core to Hewitt’s mission. Through coursework, student-led initiatives, and school-wide programming, Hewitt students come to understand their relationships and responsibilities to the environment, to one another, and to themselves. Service is a core component of Hewitt’s sustainability programming, and we encourage all members of our community to consider what the planet gives to us and how we can give back to the planet.
Our K-12 Approach to Sustainability Education
At Hewitt, sustainability education focuses on six core competencies:
- Sense of Place: I can appreciate and recognize my interdependent relationship with my school, home, and community, and I am a responsible steward of these places.
- Environmental Literacy: I am aware of environmental challenges such as pollution, global climate change, and biodiversity loss, and am committed to making a positive impact on the environment.
- Systems Thinking: I can identify, describe, and analyze real-world challenges from multiple perspectives and make decisions in the design, implementation, and assessment of comprehensive solutions.
- Responsible Local and Global Citizenship: I continuously develop and cultivate a sense of civic identity and local/global responsibility.
- Sustainable Economics: I can understand and evaluate the relationship between the environment and the economy, including the need for economic growth strategies that protect natural resources for future generations.
- Ability to Take Action: I can plan and take action against environmental injustice to create change in my community and forge an equitable, sustainable, and joyous future.
Service Learning
Whether collecting coats for New Yorkers in need, cleaning up Central Park, or volunteering their time to create dental hygiene kits for local health clinics, Hewitt students are thinkers, learners, and doers who affect change in their communities. Our partner organizations include:
- All Souls Soup Kitchen
- AmeriCares
- Billion Oyster Project
- Central Park Conservancy
- Daniel's Music Foundation
- GiGi's Playhouse
- Grassroots Grocery
- Harlem United
- The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society
- Meals on Wheels
- The New York Common Pantry
- New York City Department of Parks and Recreation
- Operation Smile
- Project Cicero
- Rescuing Leftover Cuisine
- Riley's Way Foundation
- Riverside Premier Rehabilitation and Healing Center
- Siena House
Sustainability in Action
First graders visit Hewitt’s rooftop garden to learn about local plants and pollinators and explore sustainable features like solar panels and a rain barrel
Middle schoolers build their environmental literacy through exploration of the biodiversity, species relationships, and water quality within our local parks and waterways
Middle schoolers plan, organize, and host an annual Sustainability Spring Market where community members can purchase vegetables, herbs, and flowers grown by Hewitt students
High schoolers engage in deep dive learning experiences with professionals at Black Rock Forest Consortium, Governors Island, Jones Beach Nature and Energy Center, and The Ashokan Center
In Uncovering Climate Change: Science, Economics, and Culture, high schoolers study the physics and chemistry of global warming and complete action research projects. For example, Caroline Baillie ’22 and Natalia Macia ’22 designed and built out Hewitt's rooftop garden as a way to reduce our carbon footprint
The student-led rooftop garden project was highly interdisciplinary in nature, involving engineering and design, climate science, agriculture, and construction
During a visit to The New York Climate Exchange research facility, upper schoolers learn from professionals working in the field of sustainability
Each week, students work with Rescuing Leftover Cuisine to donate uneaten food from the Hewitt dining room to our local community
In middle and upper school, students travel to the Catskill Mountains for experiential learning at The Ashokan Center
Students and faculty participate in a clean up activity at Brooklyn’s Plumb Beach
Through our partnership with the Billion Oyster Project, K-12 students conduct research into oyster populations, biodiversity, and water quality in the East River
A middle schooler leads Hewitt’s battery recycling program
During their weeklong “mini-mester,” fifth graders engage in a thorough investigation into New York City’s water sources
Hewitt’s Signature Honors Through Extended Inquiry (EI) program invites students to engage in independent research and exploration around topics in sustainability
The middle school Sustainability Team prepares for their spring plant sale
Upper schoolers in our Leadership for Sustainability course plant greens, veggies, herbs, and flowers in Hewitt’s rooftop garden
Lower schoolers extend their learning beyond the classroom through work in Hewitt’s rooftop garden
In Central Park, K-12 students practice responsible stewardship of their local environment
Upper schoolers attend workshops at Columbia University’s Climate School during NYC Climate Week
In The World on Your Plate: Nutrition, Culture, & the Ecology of Food Systems, students visit a local business to learn about cacao sourcing processes and transparent trade practices