This past weekend Energy Service Corps members from around the state headed north to Custer, WI for the Midwest Renewable Energy Association’s 23^rd Annual Energy Fair. It’s the largest renewable energy fair in world and we were all very excited to take part in the event. With members coming and going from Thursday through Sunday, we were involved in too many fun activities to even describe. On Thursday ESC members taught a large lesson (over 100 kids!) at the Boys and Girls Club of Steven's Point and made a splash with their interactive presentation that included “Energy Dodgeball.” ESCers from the Oshkosh campus took the lead in a presentation on Saturday about saving energy as a renter. The presentation was filled with great information tailored to renters and was well received by the crowd. The weather was hot and steamy and camping provided fun for all after fair hours. The weekend also marked the completion of Viv’s term of service. From all the members of the Madison team – Thank you Viv for everything you’ve done. You’re the best!

Monona, a beautiful city just south of Madison will be my and Nick's new home this summer! That's right, as WISPIRG Energy Service Corps did with Middleton last summer, the Energy Service Corps will be doing with Monona this summer. Our main goals are huge community pushes for energy conservation through education of students (we make it a fun way to spend summer vacation!) and energy assessments of homes to help save residents of Monona money and electricity.

Leading the effort in Monona will be me, Brendan, and Nick, both AmeriCorps members at WISPIRG Energy Service Corps (a WISPIRG/AmeriCorps partnership).We will be making the fun phone calls for this Tree City USA and Water Star WI town of just over 8,000 and making sure that all goes well in this wonderful place. Yet, our planning is not to say that none of the other members are staying out of Monona either! Every member will be in some capacity familiar with the city by the end of summer, be it through education (Drew, Maliya, and Caitlin) or energy assessment canvassing and media coordination (Brandt and Tyler). Soon, we hope that we will be generating press with energy assessments of government officials' homes and education throughout the greater Madison area.

As for our education, it’s been a busy week for us trying to get as many K-12 education lessons scheduled as possible. Energy Service Corps members have been glued to their phones as they call different youth groups and educational centers in the Madison area. We were lucky to have a lot of favorable responses and are looking forward to being able to cement plans for an education lesson with many youth organizations this summer. Caitlin made contact with the Mount Horeb Public Library and was able to organize a lesson for us on July 9^th and I set up a Sunday school lesson for July 22^nd with the Monona United Methodist Church. We’ve also had some very constructive talks with several organizations all over the Madison area and we look forward to being able to announce more lessons in the days to come.  Collectively we’re looking forward to participating in these and the rest of the lessons we’ll be participating in over the course of the summer.

We are also happy to announce Energy Service Corps return to the “Duck Pond” at Warner Park for the Sustain Dane Mallards Go Green Night! This event, taking place on July 17^th, emphasizes groups and organizations that have helped make Dane County more sustainable. We’ll be at the ball park passing out free information about energy efficiency and offering free home energy assessment sign ups. We hope to see lots of people at the Mallards game supporting the Sustain Dane initiative.

Other things ESC is up to include dabbling in technology: app development, blogging, and producing YouTube videos all while reaching out to kids and adults alike to lead the forefront to conserve energy.

To add to the fun we're already having, this weekend (June 15-17) we will be volunteering at the Midwest Renewable Energy Association fair. It's kind of a big deal, being that it is the largest renewable energy fair in the world, but we don't want to brag.

As you can probably guess, we are all well on our way to completing our 300 AmeriCorps hours in just two more months and none of us can even imagine everything what we will have accomplished in just one summer!

We hope you follow us by reading our newsletter published every other Sunday, our frequently-updated blog (you're on it!), liking us on Facebook, following us on Twitter, viewing us on YouTube, and most importantly, talking to us in person if you haven't yet had a free energy assessment or signing up for one on the interwebs!