Making the Grade.

AMERICAN FORESTS' "A Tree For Every Child" program is off and running. Teachers and kids tell us what they like.

"Every day [my students] move me so by their contributions--not getting ice cream at lunch, emptying their piggy banks, asking their parents to give up something--in order to save money to plant trees."

Earth Day is a time to celebrate the world around us and renew our commitment to care for the natural world. That spirit is embodied in the efforts of children who this year showed that regardless of your age, your actions can make a difference.

Teacher Hilary Prager and her sixth grade class at Middletown, New York's Monhagen Middle School embody that spirit. Many of Prager's students receive subsidized lunches and loans, but the children sacrificed to plant trees with AMERICAN FORESTS' A Tree For Every Child program. Across the county 225 schools took part, planting more than 40,000 trees with their donations.

The concept was simple: For each $1 children raised, AMERICAN FORESTS planted a tree in a damaged forest ecosystem. Schools that raised at least $100 received a "Moon Sycamore" tree, descended from seeds carried to the moon and back aboard Apollo XIV, to plant at their school.

Each school that requested information about the program received a poster and a free learning guide that taught students how trees keep buildings cool and how they provide homes and food for animals, birds, and insects. Participating classes received a certificate large enough for all the students to sign. The educational materials were funded in part by specialty retailer Eddie Bauer.

The program resounded with both students and teachers, many who wrote AMERICAN FORESTS to say they plan to participate again next year. They praised the program for a variety of reasons.

"I liked that there was a goal the students could work for, something concrete that they could understand," said Donna Shelley, a teacher at East Rochester, New York's Lois E. Bird School. "In their age group, they could understand that people are cutting down trees and they need to plant them."

Shelley's six-person class consists of emotionally disturbed boys aged 8 to 11. They collected money by walking door to door at school with handmade signs. Wanting to track their earnings motivated the boys to learn counting, she said.

East Rochester's Prager wrote of being touched by the sacrifices of her class. "They have such giving heart[s] that whatever they have, they want to share," Prager said in a later interview.

Children found creative ways to raise money. At Beacon Day School in Oakland, California, fourth and fifth graders sold lemonade during a heat wave. Third graders at Cleghorn Elementary School in rural Elvira, Wisconsin, collected 24,500 pennies in one week. Other students held bake sales or recycled aluminum cans.

At Lawson Elementary School in Florissant, Missouri, Sandy Olsen's third, fourth, and fifth grade after-school students tapped into their love for animals. Students who collected $1 for Global ReLeaf taped a photo of their favorite pet on a tree cut from green and brown construction paper. Two girls arrived early each morning to arrange the paper trees along the walls of the school cafeteria.

The children loved the idea of planting their own tree, Olsen said. And unlike other fundraising programs, the goals of A Tree For Every Child were within reach.

"The $100 was within range," Olsen said. "The children were really excited and intrigued about the Moon Sycamore. And I liked that it didn't involve selling. A lot of fundraisers involve selling T-shirts or candy. This is much better."

In Seattle, Lynn Ronald, supervisor for the student council at the View Ridge School, focused on the Moon Sycamore because an astronaut had recently visited her first through fifth grade students. Classes competed for the right to plant the tree and for a "Moon Madness" party with ice cream and candy. About 300 children participated, including a "pretty heavy war between the fourth grades" for the prize. Ronald said she liked the personalized nature of the program.

"It seemed like a good way [to teach them about trees]," Ronald said. "Because it was a tree for every child, it made it more personal for them. [The program said] we'll plant a tree for you, and we'll plant a tree for you and you. The party didn't hurt either!"

Some children felt inspired by events in their communities. Students at Norwood-Norfolk Elementary School in Norwood, New York, "sacrificed their pennies, nickels, dimes, and quarters to help do their share to create a better world," teacher Dianna Alfano wrote in a letter. She said her students wanted to plant because they remembered a 1998 ice storm that destroyed many neighborhood trees. Their donation will plant 168 Global ReLeaf trees in a damaged forest.

Students responded most enthusiastically, though, to receiving their own Moon Sycamore. Prager's class planted its tree on a hill outside the school. Olsen's class plans to plant its tree in the fall. And at Aberdeen Preparatory School in Temple Terrace, Florida, Judy Girard's kindergarten class planted the tree it earned from a baked food sale. The teacher wrote, "These children learned a great deal about their American forests and about saving trees and the environment."

That was the goal of the program, said AMERICAN FORESTS' Executive Director Deborah Gangloff. The resulting Global ReLeaf plantings will be particularly significant because of the young people who made them possible.

"The trees will be planted on behalf of children, because they are the ones who will inherit the future with all its promise and problems," Gangloff said. "We are proud that our materials helped teach children how they can contribute to solutions to the world's challenging environmental problems."

AMERICAN FORESTS is revising its A Tree For Every Child program to incorporate comments from teachers and students. Teachers can conduct the program year round. Plus, this year students will receive one tree for each $100 they raise.

That's good news for Shelley, who hopes to do A Tree For Every Child for Earth Day 2001. The program may have been "the most successful service project" in her class' history, she said. She liked that the students both learned about trees and understood their role in helping the environment.

"[The program] motivates them," Shelley said, "They can see they need to learn to count money to figure out how many trees they planted. It gives them a purpose."

Janine Guglielmino is associate editor of American Forests.