For more than 30 days this spring, students helped plant a tree every time they hit “enter.”
To commemorate Earth Day, the Groton Public Schools launched a search pilot program, enabling students to participate in a global reforestation without leaving their desks. By introducing Ecosia, a search engine that uses ad revenue to plant trees, as a pilot default browser on students’ GPS accounts, students and faculty contributed to the planting of 864 trees.
This small tech switch, largely endorsed by the Environmental Club, has helped fund vegetation in areas like Brazil and Argentina, focusing on biodiversity hotspots and areas with high deforestation. The zero-cost project is allowing students to make a change in new, innovative ways.
The pilot project, which ran from March 20 through Earth Day on April 22, was designed to test how the collective digital habits could result in something bigger than Groton Public Schools. While individual searches only contribute a fraction toward the cost of planting a tree, the combined activity of hundreds of students throughout the month quickly adds up. Ecosia estimated that roughly 45 searches help fund one tree on average.
For many teachers, the transition to Ecosia was simple. Hillary Clifton, a science teacher and environmental advocate, stated she loved the idea of using Ecosia.
“From a teacher’s perspective, I didn’t notice much of a difference once we switched,” she said. “The only trouble I had initially was trying to open Google Drive as the waffle icon wasn’t automatically displayed when opening a new tab. I’d have to put ‘Google Drive’ into the search engine to access it, which was an extra step.”
Despite the minor inconvenience, Clifton said the environmental benefits outweigh the drawbacks.
“Overall, if it helps reduce our carbon footprint, I am very much for making the switch to using it district-wide.”
Students involved in environmental advocacy shared similar enthusiasm.
Tahlia Suarez, Vice president of the Environmental Club, stated she admires the switch as well.
“I love everything about the switch; it’s a green Google. What’s not to love?”
The success of the Earth Day pilot has caught the attention of school leadership. Due to the sheer amount of popularity from the site, along with little financial investment, district administrators are evaluating whether to implement Ecosia as a permanent default across all district devices from the upcoming school year.
If approved, Ecosia could become the permanent default search engine on all district-managed student accounts, allowing thousands of additional searches each day to contribute toward future reforestation projects.
