Cub Scouts Go Green In Medford!

This year the Boston MinuteMan Council held one session of Cub Scout Day Camp in Medford for the first time ever.   This was a particularly good choice for a location because their theme this summer is "Day Camp Goes Green".   Their location in Medford was at the base of "Windy" the wind turbine in Riverbend Park.   Realizing that the wind turbine could serve as a great educational point around energy and conservation, the Boy Scouts approached the City's Office of Energy & Environment for information and suggestions about how to tie Windy into their programming. 

This developed into a great partnership. The City is always looking for opportunities to educate people about renewable energy.  The Office suggested a craft where the campers could build their own turbines out of mostly recycled materials, I gave a talk to the campers about Windy, and we provided them with a handout for the parents with facts about Windy and an invitation to return to visit her at this year's Harvest Your Energy Festival on October 1st. 

The Cub Scouts were very interested in the turbine, making guesses at how many houses she could power (answer: 16) and contributing to their peer's education with information they had about electric cars.  The Cub Scouts learned about why the wind turbine was built, what some of the concerns were and why it is important to make clean electricity.  Afterwards they went out to touch the turbine and check out how noisy (or not) it is for themselves. 

In addition to having a speaker and activities about the wind turbine, this year the camp Den's had names like "The Recyclers", "The Composters" and "The Solar Powers".  The activities included learning to fish and doing a variety of crafts from recycled items.  The boys had a great time, my son included,  and I hope the camp comes back to Medford again next year!