The Generation Earth team can bring a variety of environmental topics into your classroom today. If you are a 6th through 12th grade teacher in Los Angeles County, then you have access to our amazing Generation Earth Project Coordinators. These environmental experts can visit your school, speak to your students and help guide a meaningful environmental service learning project. We offer a wide range of presentations and projects relating to water, waste and forestry. Below are a few of our most popular topics, but feel free to let us know if you have something else in mind.

Advocacy 101

• Students choose a cause, find their voice, research and write an effective advocacy letter to an administrator, local community leader, or elected representative.

Food Waste

• Students work in groups to become "instant experts" on the environmental and economic impacts of wasted food and create posters to share with their peers.

Let's Talk Trash

• Students discover the "final destination" of waste and how it impacts our environment, as well as simple steps to take to reduce our impact at home and school.

Native Plants

• Students find out how the native plants of Southern California save water, withstand fire and support native wildlife.

Water Pollution & Prevention

• Students learn how the urban watershed is affected by water pollution and explore an array of forward-thinking solutions to this issue.

Water Audit

• Students investigate how water flows on campus and identify potential water capture solutions like installing rain chains or rain barrels.

Book a Generation Earth Project Coordinator

Generation Earth offers three different workshops year-round in addition to our two-day Summer Institute. These workshops provide the opportunity to stay informed about local environmental issues, network and collaborate with colleagues, share experiences and gain valuable educational resources.

Building a Water Resilient Los Angeles County

• This workshop for teachers and students addresses crucial water issues including stormwater pollution and drought. Join us to explore solutions and student-led environmental action projects.

Building a Resourceful Los Angeles County

• This workshop for teachers and students covers waste management topics and student action projects including recycling, composting and more.

Taking Action: The Intersection of Education, Climate Change and Health

• This professional development workshop for teachers offers tools for incorporating climate change in the classroom and encouraging students to take action.

Summer Institute

• This two-day professional development workshop for teachers explores sustainable waste and water management solutions and resources to facilitate meaningful environmental projects.

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Generation Earth hosted our inaugural Environmental Youth Summit on March 30, 2023 at the Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County. The summit offered an exciting and inspiring day of learning for over 200 young environmental champions from 9 different schools. Students participated in a rich variety of workshops on topics such as school greening and environmental health, the benefits of trees, native plants and biodiversity. They explored approaches to becoming leaders in their communities and discovered a variety of environmental career pathways at our green career panel. At lunchtime they perused resource tables from a range of environmental organizations, painted terracotta pots and planted native seeds to take home and made eco-friendly pledges at our photo booth.

The true highlight of the day was the student presentations. A few students were chosen to share their Generation Earth projects with attendees. This was incredibly inspiring, not only for the rest of the students but for everyone in attendance. These presentations showcased tangible examples of how powerful youth-led action can be, which really complemented the message from the keynote speaker, Andy Lipkis. Andy was just 15 years old when he first founded the organization TreePeople and now TreePeople has involved over 3 million people in planting over 3 million trees. Any one of these students could have a similar impact in their communities. There is nothing but possibility ahead of them and there has never been a better time for young voices to lead the environmental movement.

The Generation Earth team put a lot of effort into making the Youth Summit a reality, so we were thrilled to be able to share the event with students. The response was incredible and we are already looking forward to next year. If you are interested in bringing your students to the Environmental Youth Summit 2024, please let us know. We had a lot of interest this year and we anticipate even more interest next year. The best way to ensure your attendance is to schedule a project with one of our coordinators early in the fall.

Contact us for more information.

Generation Earth provides free bus transportation for field trips that support environmental service learning projects. In order to qualify for a bus the trip must relate to or enhance a Generation Earth environmental service learning project. The students attending the field trip must be between 6th and 12th grade at a school within Los Angeles County and the destination must be within Los Angeles County.

Buses are subject to availability and funds are limited, so contact us to request a bus as far in advance as possible. Please do not request less than one month before the field trip.

• Teachers are eligible for one bus per school year.
• Schools are eligible for two buses per school year.
• The school (or teacher) is responsible for booking and coordinating with the field trip destination site.
• A maximum of 56 people, including adults, can be seated on a bus.
• Schools may cancel the bus no later than 48 hours prior to the field trip.
• Late cancellations forfeit your bus for the year. You may be billed.
• Generation Earth is not responsible for lost or stolen items on any field trip.
• Passengers are required to follow COVID protocols per Los Angeles County Public Health orders and chartered bus company’s requirements.

Students from South Gate Middle School joined Generation Earth coordinators for a series of educational workshops over the course of six weeks. During the first three weeks, students focused on water pollution and prevention, the impacts of waste on the environment, and the benefits of trees. During the Water Pollution and Prevention presentation the students were quizzed using an interactive virtual board game and the winners walked away with eco-friendly swag. The game was a great success with many of the students expressing how much fun they had, so the Generation Earth coordinators decided to create games for all of the remaining workshops.

During the second round of the workshops, students learned about plastic pollution, the four R’s, and soil health. To assess students’ knowledge and encourage critical thinking, a Jeopardy-style game was utilized during the Plastic Pollution presentation. During the Four R’s presentation, an environmental loteria (bingo) game generated discussion and led to new insights. Lastly, during the Soil Health presentation students worked in teams to compete in a comprehensive quiz game which covered all the topics throughout the six weeks. These games were a fun and effective way to engage the South Gate students with these vital environmental topics.

This workshop series was coordinated with Ms. Jessica Mejia and the amazing teachers at South Gate Middle School. If you would like to coordinate a similar workshop series for your students, follow this link to book a Generation Earth Project Coordinator.

For any local education agencies located in County Unincorporated Communities, you can also receive a FREE waste consultation and additional resources to reduce waste and implement or enhance existing recycling practices on campus. If you are interested in a waste consultation, visit BusinessRecycling.com and submit your request today! For any questions or more information, please email BusinessRecycling@pw.lacounty.gov.