Springside Chestnut Hill Academy may be the greenest school in Philly

Is Springside Chestnut Hill Academy the greenest school in Philly? The National Wildlife Federation just said as much after it awarded the school with a Green Flag.

Springside Chestnut Hill Academy just received the Green Flag from NWF for all of the campus’s sustainable initiatives, from green roofs to solar panels to water conservation. The Green Flag is the highest award that the NWF has and makes SCH Academy the first and only independent school in Pennsylvania to earn the distinction. Just 150 schools in the country have Green Flags.

The private school campus sits on 62 acres right by the Wissahickon Valley Park and includes a Gold LEED-certified building, solar panels, and multiple rain gardens that help reduce waste and runoff into the Wissahickon watershed.

There are also multiple green initiatives that the students can also take part in, including a Green Task Force: A pretty extensive recycling and composting program in the cafeterias; vegetable and herb gardens; and trail maintenance in the nearby Wissahickon Valley Park.

The school’s green efforts have been at least two decades in the making. After being recognized as a Green Ribbon School in 2012 by the U.S. Department of Education, Springside then decided to take its green efforts further by entering the NWF’s Eco-Schools USA program.

Take a tour of the green campus below: