Madeleine Choir student is surprised with award

SALT LAKE CITY — Claire Adler, a third grade student at the Madeleine Choir School, walked with her class into the chapel early May 20, as usual to attend Laudes. However, after praying she received the surprise of her life. She was an unsuspecting contest winner and was awarded a prize.

Adler is the Utah State winner of the "Igniting Creative Energy Challenge," an educational competition sponsored by Johnson Controls and the National Energy Foundation, that encourages North American students to develop ingenious ways to conserve energy and protect the environment.

The concept of the contest was for the students to learn how an individual’s own wise energy choices and environmental stewardship can help reduce energy consumption and improve the community in which we live. Adler competed against students in the entire state of Utah in kindergarten through twelfth grade.

Shannon Poulson and Bob Poulson from National Energy Foundation, and Wendy Grosvenor and George Tocquigny from Johnson Controls presented Adler with her award. Adler was presented with a $1,000 check for the Madeleine Choir School, and a 2GB flash audio (MP3) player for herself.

Adler’s winning project was a board game she created titled "Go Mow!" Players are challenged to mow their lawn while learning interesting facts about the costs of gas-powered mowers. Adler’s goal is to encourage homeowners to use manual reel mowers to maintain their lawns.

Fred Adler, Claire’s father, said after Claire heard about the contest she immediately came home and said she wanted to do a project on push mowers. Fred uses a push mower and she is impressed with him. She thought up the idea herself, and got right to work.

Her mother, Anne Adler, said Claire said right away she was going to do a board game because she loves board games. Claire said the results of the game would be if you use a push mower good things will happen, and if you use a power mower bad things happen.

"Together Claire and I went online and got the facts about energy consumption and pollution, and she had her own ideas about what a push mower is good for," said Anne. "Then at that point, Claire came up with the idea of how she wanted the board game to be. She got the board, colored it, and had the information placed on it. So this is really exciting for her.

"There is a limited supply of energy that will run out some day," said Claire. "I am also interested in conserving energy because it will help to stop pollution. It would stop pollution because it will stop global warming and help save the world. There are many ways to conserve energy. One important way is to use a push lawn mower. Americans use 600 million gallons of gasoline to mow and trim their lawns every year. When Americans use lawn equipment, they spill 17 million gallons of fuel.

"I made a board game to teach people to use a push mower," said Adler. "In the game each player tries to mow his lawn while learning interesting facts about energy costs and power mowers. Using push mowers will help my friends and family because it will not be as smelly and loud when people mow their lawns. It will help stop pollution. It will conserve energy. I hope that people will use more push lawn mowers and fewer gas mowers."