August means one important thing for many families: time to get kids ready to go back to school. The month finds many people packing up their outdoor adventure or water gear – much of it derived from the processing of oil and natural gas – and trading it for new clothes and supplies for children to report to orientation and the first day of classes.

Some families with middle and high school-aged children also prepare for the annual rite of passage of pre-season sports tryouts and practices, where oil and natural gas dominate on the football field, soccer pitch and cross-country course, to name just a few.

PIOGA goes back to school this month as well, taking a look at all of the items on families’ shopping lists made possible with the production of American-made oil and natural gas, along with a checklist for fall sports pre-seasons and tryouts.

Put your lunch and jacket in your cubbyhole and find your desk!

Backpack Essentials

The writers and editors at Good Housekeeping have been sending kids back to school for decades. While their list of backpack essentials for middle and high school students includes a few items like combination locks and graph and other types of paper, the majority of items below depend on oil and natural gas to be stuffed into their lightweight, high-performance synthetic fabric backpacks:
          • Laptop computer
          • Graphing calculator
          • Pencil pouch
          • Ballpoint pens
          • Pencil sharpener
          • Highlighters
          • Permanent markers
          • Erasers
          • Personal organizer/calendar
          • Three-ring binder
          • Three-hole punch
          • White-Out
          • Protractor
          • Plastic ruler
          • Scissors with plastic handles
          • Stretchable book socks
          • Plastic folders
          • Glue
          • Post-Its
          • Plastic lunchbox
While the list changes a little for younger students to include items like crayons, washable markers and rubber pencil grips, nothing changes in terms of their reliance on fossil fuels.

Helmets On, Mouthguards In!

The items needed to outfit athletes and put them on the fields – many of them made of advanced synthetic turf – for various fall sports are almost too numerous to mention. Start with the fact that student-athletes need to clear pre-season physicals, which include any number of medical devices made of plastic, rubber and other synthetic materials.

It is fair to say that every item worn by youth and high school-aged football players has oil or natural gas at its core. This includes helmets, pads, shoes, mouthguards, gloves, performance clothing and eye-black. The high-school quarterback, however, does hand off and pass a leather football, unlike younger players who use synthetic balls.
Turning to other common fall scholastic sports – golf, soccer, cross-country, field hockey, and girls’ volleyball and tennis – it is fair to say steel club shafts and irons used to hit a golf ball and wooden sticks to smack a field hockey ball around are the only non-fossil-fuel derived tools in the bags of those athletes. Balls, uniforms, shoes, shin guards and the bags themselves are all fossil-fuel based.

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THE FACTS:

The items essential to the start of a school year are no different than many others that make life easier for consumers around the U.S. and across the globe. They can only be made using oil, natural gas or natural gas liquids as raw materials which are then refined into products we use every day.

PIOGA encourages everyone to keep safety at the top of your back-to-school list. This includes watching for children on foot or on bikes on their way to and from school, and never passing a stopped school bus (which also consists of many pieces of equipment made from oil and gas).

Best of luck to all students heading back to the classroom for a productive and safe learning experience this year!
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Click HERE to download/print the Taking Oil & Gas Back to Class Fact Sheet.
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