School Recycling Project

RATIONAL/BACKGROUND

School recycling project provides its stakeholders with hands-on

experience that helps them grow to see that efforts to cut the wasteful use of
resources does make a difference. A variety of proactive activities can be used
to teach everyone to take responsibility for keeping the Earth cleaner and to
learn how to help the environment for a better future. According to the U.S.
EPA, recycling: conserves natural resources to help sustain the environment;
reduces the need for landfilling and incineration; saves energy and prevents
pollution caused by the extraction and processing of virgin materials therefore
Recycling is necessary to reduce waste in homes, schools and work places.

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

School recycling project is focuses on three key areas:

have better resource management;

to cultivate stakeholders awareness on proper waste management; and

reduction of waste.

DESCRIPTION

A school recycling project can help stakeholders aware of where all that trash
goes and the fact that it is ‘go’, doesn't just ‘go away’. It's important to bring
landfills to the attention of future generations, because they are the ones that
will have to live with the consequences.

Landfills

Teaching about landfills and recycling is a great opportunity to show everyone

in a better way. It's an opportunity to let them know that 80 percent of the trash
filling our landfills actually could be recycled and the materials used to
manufacture new products. With budget cuts, some schools may worry about
implementing another program, but recycling at the school level offers everyone
the practical lesson and it can be both affordable and efficient and in some
cases even generate funds to help support the project.

School Recyclables
Among items recycled school items, paper is the most significant cost-saving
waste reduction. Just think of how much paper a school uses. As a result, paper
makes up 50 to 60 percent of school waste. The advantage to paper is that it
can be either reused or recycled. When paper is used on both sides and fully as
scratch paper or for making copies, school paper costs drop dramatically.

The following classified materials popularly recycled:

Scrap Paper: used bond paper, used computer paper, old notebooks, old
books, old newspapers, periodicals, other newsprints, cartons and cardboards,
colored (assorted) waste paper etc.

Glass Bottles: beer, softdrinks, catchup, glass cullets (bubog) etc.

Plastics: PET – mineral water bottles, softdrinks, plastic cups, basins,

containers, hard plastic, CD cases etc.

OPERATION/IMPLEMENTATION

Planning

do a survey of how many people are involved (students and employees);

check the amount of garbage generated daily and determine a place to store
recyclables until they are collected;

determine where the recyclable material will be sent: if it will be donated to a

cooperative of scavengers, whether it is sold, who will collect and how often. Do
not start a selective collection program without knowing where to send the
material;

do only selective collection of material that can be sent to recycling;

develop a communication program of selective collection and community

mobilization, that everyone knows how and why to participate.

follow up the collection of recyclables, its storing, and its donation;

Implementation

find the necessary equipment;

train the people involved with the school recycling (cleaning personnel,
employees, students, for example);

start the communication and mobilization campaign;

inaugurate the school recycling program with an event (video presentation,

lecture).

Hands-on recycling activities

Implementing:

necessary equipment: 2-3 cardboard boxes (reused from the supermarket).

train the people involved with the school recycling: a brief talk with the
secretaries and the cleaning personnel; activities to be developed with the
students.

inaugurate the school recycling program with an event.

Keeping the School Recycling ‘Alive’

follow up the collection of recyclables, its storing, and its donation;

make a periodic review of the school recycling program and disseminate the
results to the school. The results can be disseminated by numbers of cardboard
boxes collected every Wednesday. The results will be shown in tables
(graphics) in the snack bar area and in the classroom for the students follow the
collection up.

continuous mobilization program will be done by talking to the people involved

from time to time. The students will be stimulated to continue by doing ‘fast’
activities in class.