After a very successful 2 year secondment to Brilliant Labs, I am back in the classroom. Now I am teaching Science 10- Science for a Sustainable Society. The topics are around chemistry, circuits and power generation. I wanted students to make a tangible difference in their lives, to live a more sustainable life rather than just do a project and write a test. Of course, you should never follow someone who is not willing to go first.

I promised both classes that I would cycle to school every day that it was safe. I have tried to make this school year resolution for the past 3 years and only lasted 2 weeks. Not only did I tell students, but I also told parents. I am committed now.

La Bikery helped me reduce, reuse and recycle my 1990’s mountain bike from my New Mexico desert days. Other than cables, chain and rear cassette, we were able to update from the original parts to a 1×7 format.

So far, it has been 100%, even on the day that it rain so hard the puddles were over my axles. In order to show the students that I am doing it, I put the bike in my classroom. When the snow gets deeper, it will become too messy to store the bike there.

There is an interesting experiment happening. When I get my bike out of the cold shed in the morning, I max out at 5th or 6th gear and it is much more of a workout. However, when I ride home, I take the bike from the nice heated school and I easily travel in the 7th gear. It has been -10oC and 20 cm of snow. We will see what happens when it gets really cold!