THOMASTON — Earlier this month, nine male Trekkers students and two leaders volunteered with WindowDressers,and spent the morning and afternoon at the organization’s production facility in the Lincoln Street Center in Rockland constructing window inserts that will be sold at affordable rates around the state.

WindowDressers is a volunteer, nonprofit organization dedicated to helping Maine residents reduce heating costs, fossil fuel consumption, and CO2 emissions by lowering the amount of heat lost through windows.

The students participating in this community-service project were members of Trekkers' 11th-grade classes, Team Panther and Team Puma. In addition to programming that is specific to each team of students, Trekkers also offers gender-specific activities throughout the school year. On a monthly basis, this group of guys has been meeting with Program Manager Brandon Caron for discussion-based dinners, during which they have planned outings that will incorporate one of the Trekkers educational core components: community service, wilderness experience, cultural awareness, environmental education or outdoor/adventure-based recreation.

Speaking about the WindowDressers experience, Caron said in a news release, "I think we have something pretty powerful and important in this group. It's rare to find a group of teenage guys who want to give up a Saturday to give back to their community and it was formed purely by the students' own demand for it. I'm energized by it and excited to see where they decide to take things in the future."

WindowDressers developed a "community build" model inspired by an old-fashioned barn-raising, where neighbors help neighbors build window inserts for a week in their local community. They call this the Community Build Program.

WindowDressers' inserts offer an inexpensive alternative to window replacement. Their customers save, on average, 10-20 percent on their fuel consumption, generally returning their investment within the first heating season. Part of the organization's mission is to donate 25 percent of their inserts to low income families for a contribution of $10 for up to 10 inserts. With 30 percent of building heat loss occurring through windows, WindowDressers volunteers manufacture insulating inserts, which reduce the need for heat during cold seasons. There are 557,000 homes in Maine, and more than 90 percent of them need weatherization. WindowDressers is building more than 5,000 window inserts this year and is in desperate need of volunteers.

To learn more about volunteering with this group of Trekkers, contact Caron at 207-594-5095 or email him at brandon@trekkers.org.

For more information about volunteering with WindowDressers, contact Director Eileen Wilkinson at 207-230-9902 or email her at eileen@windowdressers.org.