The Impact Group of students who meets in our school asked if I had any ideas for them for service projects. Every day when I throw my newspaper away, I’m conscious of the fact that we’re not doing enough to recycle. Thanks to Wendy Sanfillipo from the Cornell Cooperative Extension, we’re on our way.
Abitibi will give us two boxes for paper recycling. We’re a bit beyond their target area, so it was through Wendy that we got the boxes. These are the big green and yellow boxes you may have seen at other schools or churches? As long as we fill both of them each month they will continue to come out and pick up our recyclables.
Where do the student leaders of the Impact Group come in? They are planning to organize the effort, helping to educate our school community on what’s allowed in the boxes and what isn’t, collecting the recycling boxes from the classrooms and offices and filling the dumpsters. I’m hoping they can work with some of our super sixth graders to get a similar effort going in the elementary building. The Abitibi company pays us a small amount (approximately $20 per month depending on how much they collect) for the pounds of paper they pick up. The Impact Group is going to receive this money to turn around and do additional service projects in our community. We all get to do something good, something that’s right for our environment, and the students of the Impact Group get to maximize the effort by turning around and helping others.
The best part? Every student and adult in our community can contribute every time they make the choice to put the right items in the recycling box instead of in the trash. And our community members can bring their recyclables to the school and put them into our Abitibi paper receptacles too. Watch for more information on this blog about how to participate–a guest blog post from our Impact Group leaders coming soon!