About
Coquille Houshour, M.S.Ed., M.S.Ed.
Technology Teacher, Ronald Edmonds Learning Center, Brooklyn, NY
Co-Founder, Educating Tomorrow
Co-Chair, UFT Green Schools Committee
Coquille Houshour grew up in Oregon and earned a BA in Environmental Studies and International Studies from the University of Oregon where she worked with the campus recycling team. As part of her studies, she volunteered in England through Willing Workers on Organic Farms, at The Agroforestry Research Center in Belize and on Costa Rican coffee farms through The Earth Island Institute.
After working with non-profits around human rights, she became a New York City Teaching Fellow, receiving Masters in Teaching in 2005. She has incorporated environmental awareness into her curriculum, including composting in her classroom and implementing a school-wide recycling programs. In its first year, her previous school won the NYC Department of Sanitation’s Golden Apple Super Recyclers award for the borough of Brooklyn. Her environmental educational projects received of grants from Captain Planet, the Go Green Initiative, Target and the Citizen’s Committee of NY. Concerned most NYC schools were not recycling, she co-founded Educating Tomorrow in 2007 and the UFT Green Schools Committee in 2008 to help make NYC schools more eco-friendly. In June 2008, she testified before the NYC Council about the lack of recycling in NYC schools.
That same year, she received her MA in Education Administration with the hopes of starting a model eco-school in NYC. In the meantime, she is working on getting her current school recycling, gardening and composting. She is a certified Master Composter and Globe teacher. She is also an active member of Sustainable Flatbush, regularly attends the Brooklyn Solid Waste Advisory Board meetings and works on the Park Slope Food Coop Recycling Squad.
You can reach her at coquille@houshour.com or coquille@educatingtomorrow.org.