With budget cuts increasing every year, local teachers are saving trash to meet their classroom needs. Thomson Elementary, Norris Elementary and Maxwell Elementary schools earn money for used drink pouches, cookie and candy wrappers, chip bags and other trash that they send in to various participating companies.  Thomson Elementary School has the biggest "trash to cash" program, according to Lauren Taylor, public relations person for TerraCycle. TerraCycle accepts empty drink pouches, chip bags, cookie wrappers, candy wrappers, yogurt cups, Lunchables and lotion tubes and pays the school two cents for each unit of packaging.

The Friends of Van Cortlandt Park is collecting non-recyclable items as part of a promotion to reduce waste and to raise money for various programs. Items being collected are: candy wrapper packaging from Mars/Wrigley or Cadbury; empty drink pouches from Honest Kids, Capri Sun and Kool-Aid; and empty Elmer’s glue bottles and sticks. For each item sent in, the Friends receive 2 cents. Those interested in volunteering should contact the group for further instructions at 718-601-1460, or go to www.vancortlandt.org. The program is done in conjunction with Terracycle, an eco-friendly group that “upcycles” the collected materials into new, ecofriendly and affordable products. For more information, go to http://www.terracycle.net.

With budget cuts increasing every year, local teachers are saving trash to meet their classroom needs. Thomson Elementary, Norris Elementary and Maxwell Elementary schools earn money for used drink pouches, cookie and candy wrappers, chip bags and other trash that they send in to various participating companies. Thomson Elementary School has the biggest "trash to cash" program, according to Lauren Taylor, public relations person for TerraCycle. TerraCycle accepts empty drink pouches, chip bags, cookie wrappers, candy wrappers, yogurt cups, Lunchables and lotion tubes and pays the school two cents for each unit of packaging. Ms. Taylor said Thomson Elementary students collected approximately 82,000 wrappers and earned $1,640 during the first semester of last school year. It is not yet known how much was collected/earned during the second semester. In addition to the products turned into TerraCycle, Thomson Elementary students also collect Campbell's soup labels, General Mills Box Tops for Education, Coke caps and tabs, old ink cartridges, old cell phones, empty Neosporin tubes, gum packages, and empty Ziploc bags. All items earn money for the school, with the exception of Coke can tabs, which Mrs. Giles sends to the Ronald McDonald House for their benefit. Maxwell Elementary School also participates in the TerraCycle program. Parent volunteer Judith Hodges was recognized by News Channel 12 for her efforts at the school. According to Ms. Taylor, Maxwell Elementary students collected almost 63,000 wrappers and pouches, earning the school $1,250 after the first semester. Maxwell Elementary Principal Donna Bennett said those numbers should be higher after the second semester, because Mrs. Hodges has hosted several contests with big prizes, such as a week-end at the beach. At Norris Elementary, QUEST students who make up the "Green Team" collect Capri Sun pouches and Frito Lay chip bags for TerraCycle. QUEST teacher Khrista Kent said the school has no parent volunteer to assist in the efforts, so their collection is much smaller. She said Norris Elementary earned approximately $45 during the first semester. "It just helps us focus on recycling, and we used the money to buy flowers that the students planted around the school," Mrs. Kent said. TerraCycle uses the trash to make a range or products like Seed Starter kits, pencil cases, cleaner bottles and tote bags. In a release, Ms. Taylor said the trash "came full circle back to Thomson" this year when these items were sold at Walmart in Thomson for the first time in early April. For information, visit www.terracycle.net.

TerraCycle's Green Up Shop in New York City is profiled in a Japanese magazine.

As part of a new collaboration, a handful of residents is turning trash into cash. It's an effort to go green while getting green. One of the first programs Gilbert teamed up with in town is Upcycle It! created by fellow resident Kristina Greene. The initiative collects non-recyclable items such as chip bags, candy-bar wrappers, coffee bags and juice pouches in a number of drop-off bins around town. The bins are collected weekly and then sent to Terracycle, an international company that takes the "trash" and makes it into a number of products. Skittles wrappers become an insulated cooler tote bag. Crushed computers and fax machines are morphed into flower pots. Circuit boards are reused as clipboards and drink coasters. Oreo Cookie packaging is transformed into a kite and much more. The innovative "recycling" is not the only benefit to Westford. Each piece of trash that's collected and sent in is worth anywhere from two cents for chip bags to 25 cents for cell phones. All the money Greene collects from Upcycle It! is then donated back to Westford schools.

Amanda Owens has turned trash into a high school credit. Amanda, 15, spent her sophomore year at Smith-Cotton High School running a recycling program as a class. Amanda said she was looking for a class to fill her fifth block when she heard about the opportunity to implement and manage the program. “I had to write a proposal to the administration first,” she said. Once administrators approved the proposal, it was sent to the school board, where it also was authorized. Then the real work started. Amanda needed large outside bins and several smaller containers to place inside the school before the program could even be initiated on campus. So, she wrote more letters, sent e-mails and made phone calls. The teenager’s tenacity paid off when the city of Sedalia agreed to place large recycling containers behind the school. And Sutherlands donated four large plastic trash cans with hinged lids. “When I got (the bins), I was excited,” Amanda said. “That’s what we needed to get started.” With the help of Mona McCormack, the Smith-Cotton teacher who served as the advisor for the recycling program, Amanda placed two bins in the teacher’s work rooms. She then sent another mass e-mail to teachers and staff members at the high school informing them of the placement of the bins and what materials would be accepted. “I collected newspapers, magazines and white paper,” Amanda said. With the paper collection sites set, Amanda expanded her operation to the lunch room, where she asked the cafeteria staff to place the large tin cans in the recycling bins instead of the trash can. Amanda said staff members embraced the program and immediately began filling the bins with empty cans. But Amanda didn’t stop there. Through word-of-mouth and a presentation played during lunch periods, Amanda also began asking students to drop off candy, chip and Capri sun juice bags in McCormack’s room. McCormack said the bags will be sold to a company called TerraCycle for 2 cents apiece. TerraCycle creates a variety of products with the bags including purses, coolers and pencil bags. The money earned will be put back into the recycling program. Amanda said the program, which is in its first year, has been a success and she is looking forward to expanding it during the upcoming school year.

MARQUETTE - The fourth- and fifth-graders in JoeyLynn Selling's class at North Star Elementary are turning snack time into a schoolwide recycling project. The kids have spent much of the school year collecting hundreds of chip bags, candy wrappers and juice pouches that would have otherwise ended up in a landfill and sending them off to be recycled into everything from backpacks to lunch boxes to notebook covers. The "trash" is boxed up and shipped to a project called TerraCycle, which uses the packaging to make tote bags, pencil cases and other items. "They have purses and handbags and backpacks," student Alli Goriesky said. "It's a lot of fun." The program accepts packaging from Frito Lay, Mars Snackfood and Kashi products. The products are then sold at retailers around the country, including the classroom store at North Star and at www.terracycle.net. "This is basically a big class project," Selling said. "Somebody's assigned to recyclables. We call it 'lunch patrol.'" Kids in the class split up responsibilities including collecting the wrappers and packaging from the entire school during lunch, washing out the juice packages and sorting them.  Even when out on field trips the kids have been known to pick up litter to put toward their project."Everybody knows now," said student Elena McCombie, explaining that other classes in the school have begun forwarding their trash to the collection.  "We'll put the box at basketball games," Goriesky said.In addition to being able to have the recycled products in their store, the class also gets two cents per item collected.  The project allows the class to send in about a pound of wrappers and juice pouches at a time, and encourages participants to also use recycled shipping materials."It's trash and it gives them a responsibility in the classroom," Selling said.

James River High School students collect drink pouches to raise funds for the Exceptional Education class.

Anyone who packs a bagged lunch for a school-aged child knows that the Ziploc sandwich bag is for much more than just sandwiches. A regular packed lunch can have many, many Ziplocs, holding items such as sandwich, chips, carrot sticks, strawberries, and cookies. After lunch, all of these bags just end up in the trash. TerraCycle to the rescue!

“I read about this TerraCycle program (in Reader’s Digest), which directly uses the items recycled. It looked like what we wanted to do, Hill said. “I was thinking it was just a small program, but then I saw it in a Better Homes and Gardens ad,” she said.