TOPIC: The Green Gators chose to continue foucusing on the issue of tire pressure. Our qualifying project taught us the importance of properly inflated tires. In our first project we made our local community aware and now that we have seen its effect on a small scale, we are applying our knowledge on a greater level. Our research showed us that a quarter of drivers are driving on under inflated tires! This seemingly small problem causes billions of excess pounds of carbon dioxcide to be emitted. We saw that this problem was relatively simple to fix: it only takes a few minutes to properly inflate tires! So we applied the our local school bus lot. With the help of the Service Managers, we constructed a plan to maintain correct tire pressure and thus save money and fuel.
OBJECTIVE: Through our research, we found that if every car in America had properly inflated tires, 80million pounds of CO2 would be prevented from entering the atmosphere. When the Green Gators realized the immensity of the potential results, we wondered how we could turn the statistics into a reality. We decided that car dealerships would be the best place to regualte tire pressure.
PLAN: We decided to focus on car dealerships because every car must visit a dealership to be serviced . We decided on a plan: to make the proper maintenance of tire pressure a standard part of service routines.
IMPLEMENTATION: First we met several times with the Service Manager of our local Toyota Dealership, where they service over 80 cars a day. He agreed to collect data for us: for one week the technitians measured every car's incoming and outgoing tire pressure. Our next step was finding a way to make sure proper tire pressure would be regulated. Again, awareness was the way to do this: we needed to make the dealership aware of the importance of properly inflated tires and the impact they have on it. To do this, the Green Gators created a movie to show the technicians. The movie is informative and meant to motivate the technians to take care of the tire pressure. Our next step was finding a way to make sure proper tire pressure would be regulated. This was positively recieved at our local dealership. We were then ready to take our plan to an even bigger level.
In order to truly make our message and plan national we composed packages in order to send them to dealerships across the nation. The packages contain a letter describing our project, goals, and the importance of tire pressure. The package also contains informational cards we have made for customers and the Technitians video. We got in contact with the Process IMprovement Manager at Toyota Motor Sale and recieved contact information for several major dealerships across the nation. We are going to call the dealerships in a few weeks to follow up. These packages are helping us get our message across the country. We did some math and found out that if ten people picked up the card we created for the packages at each location (10) and spread the word to one other person, 200 people would be made aware of the efforts of the Green Gators and the Lexus Challenge and of the incredible power they have to make a difference. If every dealership we sent our package to followed through with our proposal/plan, approximately 800 cars would get their tires properly inflated each day. So, with these changes, 13,333 pounds of CO2 would be prevented from entering the atmosphere and and 666 gallons of gas could be saved in one day!
COMMUNICATION: Awareness is a vital part of the Green Gators' action plan. We created a third video, which we put on YouTube. The video communicates some statistics and basic facts about crucial issues of tire pressure. Our team also educated the community through our school website and school-wide letters that go home to families. The Green Gators were featured in several newspaper articles. Just through our movies we have communicated our message to over 300 people -- and this number is growing everyday!
In conclusion, if the Shipley Green Gators were to win the Final Challenge, we would use our prize money to start a fund for environmental projects. The Lexus Environmental prize money would give the current and future Green Gators incredible potential to change our school and the world we live in. We are eager to continue to spread our message.
View PICTURES of the Green Gator's progress throughout the Final Challenge