Terracycle upcycles consumer waste into new salable goods. They primarily harvest their raw material from schoolchildren as part of charity drives, though they are now placing recycling stations at certain Walmart stores. At the Walmart centers they pay 3 cents per piece, but only for a narrow range of product packaging; the website supports a wider range of recyclables.

2. Walmart installed TerraCycle recycling and garbage bins outside of New Jersey stores <http://www.causeintegration.com/2010/walmart-recycling-program-pays-cash-for-trash-with-terracycle/> , and may expand the program nationwide. TerraCycle <http://www.terracycle.net/>  takes an innovative spin on recycling and waste, taking things most people think are garbage -- like empty Capri-Sun juice bags, or Oreo cookie wrappers -- and fashioning them into cool products that kids can take to school as backpacks and more. TerraCycle has successfully "upcycled" $1.85 billion worth of garbage since its inception (and as a plug, TerraCycle is founded by a Fellow of StartingBloc <http://startingbloc.org/> , Tom Szaky).

Several guest speakers talked about how to reduce the amount of garbage that is not able to recycled, garbage that we produce daily. They also talked about how to “upcycle” garbage that we thought was all useless. And they talked about how to make schools green. Out of all the speakers, one really caught my attention. He made me realize the many things we can do with recycled items. This guest speaker was Tom Szaky, founder and CEO of TerraCycle.

It is called TerraCycle. TerraCycle recycles everyday products and turns them into new products. It helps the environment and your school at the same time. So far TerraCycle has collected $1,476,863.02 for charities and schools count as charities. The empty CapriSun packets collected each earn .02 cents and with every 500 collected you can send them to TerraCycle.

A company founded on worm excrement is turning trash into cash for St. Matthew's Lutheran School. Empty juice pouches, potato chip bags, Snicker's candy bar wrappers all are worth two cents or more to Kay Abts' students and St. Matthew's School.  Abts and the students in her seventh- and eighth-grade class have partnered with TerraCycle, a New Jersey-based firm that purchases the discarded wrappings. The erstwhile garbage will reappear on retailers' shelves as backpacks, pencil cases, totebags and other "upcycled consumer items."

TerraCycle names school one of top 100 America's Best Brigade in the Drink Pouch Brigade A Woodland elementary school has earned $774.12 for collecting drink pouches and is in the top 100 collecting schools among more than 30,000 schools participating nationwide.

Teachers and students at Altruria Elementary used to see a lot of used Capri Sun drink pouches get thrown away. But, once they signed up for a program through TerraCycle, those once discarded pouches turned into hundreds of dollars. The school began earning two cents per pouch as part of a free nationwide program that pays schools and non-profits to collect non-recyclable waste that would otherwise go to a landfill.

One of the Green Team's big projects involves "upcycling" through TerraCycle, Inc. This company collects colorful trash items, such as juice pouches, chip bags and cookie wrappers, and creates backpacks, pencil cases, folders and other fun products. TerraCycle pays schools for each item they send in. So far, the Lions Park Green Team has kept the following out of landfills: 10,012 juice pouches, 180 cookie wrappers, 2,316 chip bags and 62 tape dispensers. The school has earned $251.94 from these efforts. The Green Team will vote on how to use the funds.

Did you know that this coming Monday, November 15th, is a holiday? A green holiday. Monday is America Recycles Day, an awareness day established 13 years ago. Recycling can be profitable as well. Organizations such as RecycleBank have partnered with corporate sponsors to reward recyclers. TerraCycle has an array of fundraisers for recycled items from juice bags to cookie wrappers. On a more local note, in Our Daily Green's community, the middle school has been raising funds for a few years now to repave their track by collecting aluminum cans. Last year, the students won a $5K national grant for their efforts.

Terracycle is working with Danone yoghurts and they have launched a new programme collecting yogurt pots and they are seeking to engage schools and community groups in Liverpool.