Littlebrook Elementary is one of six schools selected from 18 in New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania to win a competitive award from the regional arts-in-education program, Young Audiences (YA) of New Jersey and Eastern Pennsylvania . This will be the first time the school will receive funding for an event that brings together art and recycling. Littlebrook has a tradition of bringing awareness of environmental issues into its classrooms. According to art teacher Colleen Dell, the school-wide festival will draw upon a collection of recycled materials that have been gathered for use in art activities. At Littlebrook, “every student has a hand in the planning, growing, harvesting, and general care of their school garden,” said Ms. Dell. “Our school has integrated garden activities into our student’s curriculum and is a member of TerraCycle as well as participants in the Green Schools Program, the Alliance To Save Energies, the Princeton Garden School Co-Op and Sustainable Princeton.” Through Terracycle “brigades,” Littlebrook students collect all types and brands of reusable containers, plus lids and foil tops. The school receives money in return for mailing these items to Terracycle. The money supports programs such as Littlebrook’s Joe Fund, which provides need-based scholarships for extracurricular activities and summer camp opportunities to any Littlebrook student in need. Ted Holsten, the ESL teacher and the school’s Terracycle coordinator, reports that in the past six years collections at the school have garnered $1,252 for the Joe Fund. Items collected, as of February 2014, include: 21,801 energy bars wrappers; 19,834 drink pouches; 7,731 dairy tubs; 7,563 snack bags; 2,670 candy wrappers; 2,239 cookie wrappers; 1,199 toner cartridges; 602 lunch kits … and the list goes on. In collaboration with Terracycle, the school has demonstrated ways in which small personal changes in habits can drastically impact the environment and community. Fifth graders have created public service announcements about the importance of TerraCycle collections. “The students learned iMovie on the ipad, did some research to plan their persuasive points and then churned out some very creative projects in science class with their science lab teacher, Mrs. Friend,” said Ms. Kosek,

This dynamic US-based company is active on four continents (including 11 EU countries), collecting difficult-to-recycle packaging, such as drink pouches, crisp bags, pens, toothbrushes, and turning it into new products including bags, benches, plant pots and watering cans. It works with consumer brands and operates local and national ‘brigades’, which collect items for recycling. Globally, TerraCycle has re-purposed more than 2.6 billion items of packaging. It is working to come up with solutions for other difficult-to-recycle but widely discarded waste streams such as disposable nappies and chewing gum.

Lewis Frasier Middle School’s Future Business Leaders of America has teamed up with Terracycle for the 2013-14 school year to promote recycling in the school and community. FBLA members and their adviser collect and sort items for recycling to help eliminate waste. The organization targets plastic bottles, aluminum cans, drink pouches and potato-chip bags. The items later are redeemed for prizes for the school.

 

It’s not often that an educator finds inspiration on the back of a juice box, but that’s what happened to Tim Sarych. Sarych is a special education management aid at the Mille Lacs Academy School. Sarych read about the TerraCycle, a recycling program for schools, on a box of Capri Sun juice. After a bit of research, Sarych registered the MLA with the TerraCycle program. “I knew this was a fundraiser that our school could benefit from,” he said. “It helps the environment, and it engages the students in a positive community activity.” Sarych started the project last winter and slowly introduced the plan to his co-workers. In the months that followed he brought the program up to full speed. Students and staff collect candy wrappers, cheese packaging, used printer cartridges, coffee bags, empty drink pouches, old cell phones, cereal bags and a long list of other would-be trash. They box the recyclables up and send them to TerraCycle and receive between 2 cents and a dollar an item. TerraCycle also pays the shipping costs. The material collected by TerraCycle is turned into garbage cans, school supplies, playground equipment, flower pots, back packs, and a wide variety of other items. Students and staff are bringing packaging from home as well as collecting them at the school. “Two cents an item doesn’t sound like a lot,” Sarych said. “But it adds up quickly.” To date the program has brought in about $200 dollars and kept 61 boxes of waste out of the local landfills. “Throwing away a candy wrapper is like throwing away money,” Sarych said. For more information go to TerraCycle.net, or call Tim Sarych at (320) 532-6848. Photos by Rob Passons.

FLORENCE, SC -- I have been recycling ever since I was knee-high to a grasshopper. OK, that might be a slight exaggeration but I know we recycled, at least to some extent, before a law was enacted in 1992 that made it mandatory to recycle certain items where I grew up (Washington County, N.Y.). Plastic bottles and aluminum cans containing carbonated beverages had a 5-cent deposit, which was an incentive to return them, especially for a college student. My family would save the containers and I would take them back when I made the nearly 1,000-mile trip home. It was a messy job, but I was happy to do it. To tell you the truth, I think I would have done it without the monetary reward.

I can’t help it; protecting our natural resources is something I am passionate about, which is why I am so excited about some things going on at Moore Intermediate School. Students, faculty and staff are participating in South Carolina Green Steps Schools, an environmental education and action initiative that recognizes schools in South Carolina that take annual sustainable steps toward becoming more environmentally responsible. One of their projects involves the collection of traditionally non-recyclable juice pouches which are sent to TerraCycle and converted into other products. By participating in program, students are learning, waste is being reduced, and the school receives 2 cents per juice pouch.

With the wide variety of individual-size packaging for food products, creating a portable lunch that will please youngsters’ tastebuds is easier than ever. However, it also causes more waste, which leads to fuller wastebaskets, and eventually, fuller landfills. That’s where the program TerraCycle comes in. The company, headquartered in New Jersey, collects difficult-to-recycle food packaging and turns it into extra money for schools. Three area schools currently are participating in this program: Bad Axe Elementary, Owendale-Gagetown Area Schools and Our Lady of Lake Huron Catholic School in Harbor Beach.