Recycling isn’t new to Mountain View. For the past two-and-a-half years, the school has been part of the TerraCycle Program. Through this program the school recycles empty Capri Sun containers, empty Lunchables containers, dried-up pens, markers, glue sticks and cell phones. Howe said the previous recycling practice has helped with the contest.

How many juice pouches does one elementary school use over the course of about two years? One school, Anchor Bay's Lighthouse Elementary in New Baltimore, has used approximately 44,640 since October 2009, second-grade teacher Rebecca Eckstein said. The dedicated collection of the used drink pouches has earned the school a place in the top 100 collecting schools of TerraCycle's Drink Pouch Brigade. This is a program that has helped the recycling company reach the milestone of 50 million pouches collected; it has also assisted the school's Parent Teacher Group to benefit students. The school learned that it had earned the honor from TerraCycle in December 2010, and received a plaque made of recycled drink pouches in the mail in January, Eckstein said. The plaque is currently displayed in a school hallway.

The dedicated collection of the used drink pouches has earned the school a place in the top 100 collecting schools of TerraCycle's Drink Pouch Brigade. This is a program that has helped the recycling company reach the milestone of 50 million pouches collected; it has also assisted the school's Parent Teacher Group to benefit students.

  Mary Baldwin College students recently added recycling receptacles from TerraCycle, a New Jersey based company that specializes in hard-to-recycle items, such as Capri Sun pouches, yogurt containers, candy wrappers, chip bags, paper towels, cell phones, tape dispensers, wine corks, writing instruments and ink cartridges.

  The Upcycling program at Bluffton-Harrison Middle School received its first check last week. About $40. Not bad for a volunteer program that sells garbage. Last October parent volunteer Cindy Kanka approached the Bluffton-Harrison school board to request BMS be allowed to participate in the upcycling program offered by New Jersey-based TerraCycle. TerraCycle uses waste products, juice pouches, cookie wrappers, chip bags, and turns them into new products. So far, they produce about 245 different products from the waste including clipboards, pencil cases and fencing.

Parents and kids at the K-2 school finished fifth in a statewide recycling contest sponsored by TerraCycle, a company started by a Princeton University dropout who sold organic “worm poop” fertilizer in used soda bottles and then branched out to make lunch bags, fences and other products from hard-to-recycle materials. TerraCycle partners with major brands to create products from packaging that otherwise might pose a public relations problem for them. The company was founded in 2001 by Tom Szaky, then a 20-year-old freshman at Princeton. When his worm fertilizer idea only finished fourth in the Princeton Business Plan Contest, he left school to develop the concept and won a $1 million competition. He turned down the money to retain control of the company. TerraCycle now operates from a Trenton headquarters decorated by graffiti artists. The company has turned nearly 2 billion pieces of trash into a line of 246 recycled and “upcycled” products sold by the likes of Walmart and Whole Foods Market. More than $1.6 million has been generated for schools and charities. On Earth Day 2009, Tom Szaky published Revolution in a Bottle: How TerraCycle is Redefining Green Business.

Countryside Elementary School has earned a $30,000 grant for placing second in a statewide contest that encourages the “upcycling” of post-consumer packaging. A public school serving children in grades K-4 in Mount Laurel, Countryside community saved 46,554 items from the trash, including juice pouches, candy wrappers, sandwich and snack bags, and yogurt containers. Parent Kate Esaia rinsed them out and prepared the items to be shipped to Terracycle, a Princeton-based international company that creates new products, such as insulated coolers, with the recycled materials. The “Trash for Cash” contest was sponsored by TerraCycle and Walmart. A total of $125,000 is being awarded to New Jersey schools that contributed the most post-consumer packaging between Oct. 1 and Dec. 15.

She found out the offer came from TerraCycle's Drink Pouch Brigade, a free fundraising program for schools and nonprofit groups that pays 2 cents for every Capri Sun pouch collected. So far, TerraCycle has collected 50 million drink pouches through its program, and paid out $1 million. "Our goal is for people to look at waste in a whole new way," said TerraCycle CEO Tom Szaky. "The $1 million that Capri Sun has helped us give out is a powerful sign of the enthusiasm that communities across the country have for the goals of this program."

  In addition to new mums, poinsettias and hard goods products, the event – dubbed Plants On Parade – gave Clearwater the opportunity to talk about a few of its unique initiatives, including an interactive sustainability initiative that involves kids collecting reusable plastic food tubs in which plants are grown. “We’ve grown our mums in these I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter tubs,” Medeiros says. “Kids will collect them after the flowers have played their role, and they’ll return them to their school or an area that’s been designated by the store for two cents each. “TerraCycle has agreed with us on an exclusive agreement and for any store that participates, we will implement a marketing/PR program that enables us to go into a geographic area around the grocery store and direct market to that elementary school.”

TerraCycle is a company that converts ordinary trash into consumer goods.  They work with schools and non-profits to obtain the materials they use.  TerraCycle provides the groups with collection kits and pays them for the waste material they send in. TerraCycle upcycles things like chips bags, drink pouches, and candy wrappers into backpacks, clipboards, buckets, and cleaning solutions.  Now TerraCycle  has introduced the Frito-Lay speakers.  These speakers are portable, foldable, and work with any computer or mp3 player that has a 3.5 mm headphone jack.  The speakers are about $20