With the addition of the new outdoor classroom at LOHS, also known as “The Farm,” where eighth period Farm to Fork students have class, LOHS has added two parking spots with electric charging stations for electric battery powered cars to charge; however, this addition has been temporarily blocked by two Student Driver Education vehicles, along with a few other parking spots. 

Anthony Vandenberg, Executive Director of Project Management, clears up the reason for why that is. “The chargers are intended to be used by our driver’s education vehicles, which are changing to electric or hybrid in the future. The pair of chargers are not meant to be used for staff or students.” These installed and active charging stations allow the student driver education vehicles to be more easily accessible and recharged without spending a lot of money on gas and also helping the environment. 

This doesn’t mean that LOHS might not be seeing more of these charging ports for students and staff as well. There is a possibility that LOSDo will be potentially investing in more electric vehicle charging stations; “technology is rapidly changing, and we are looking at other examples in Lake Oswego and neighboring communities on how to best deploy additional chargers and how they would be managed. Our new facilities include infrastructure (conduits routed to locations) for future chargers,” explained Vandenberg. 

LOSD is also continually looking for ways to switch to electric vehicles, including electric buses. “We are also actively pursuing changing our buses to electric… Switching to electricity has many positive benefits for the environment and provides an educational benefit too.”