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MODULE 7 Sharpen the Saw

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  Welcome back recycling advocates! This is our seventh iteration of promoting recycling in schools to prevent unnecessary waste from entering landfills. This week it is interesting to note that its “estimated 24% of school waste could be recycled paper and 50 % could be composted food waste.” (Lober, 2021). This week’s focus is on how to get our schools to a high level of recycling by reflecting on and building the recycling schools of the future. There are several guides and resources out there like the one from The National Wildlife Federation that is in the resources below (EPA, 2020). Its important to note that last year the United States celebrated its 50 th Anniversary of Earth day where around 20 million people worked together to recycle on behalf of mother earth! (Nature, 2020) We have come so far since the 1970s where recycling first started its real movement. On bctv.org they state “ As the environmental movement of the 1970s built momentum, so too did recycling. In 1...
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Module 6 Synergy for groups!

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                              Ah! we have made it to part six in the saga to prevent unwanted waste from entering our landfills by teaching recycling habits to students. This week I find it interesting that students and teachers are working together as teams against waste! In my local area of Anchorage, Alaska the school district has a program where teams can come together get certified and teach their entire school about recycling. On this same website, they list similar information as the EPA such as stopping on a ton of paper waste could save 15-17 trees, and recycling this same among could save 7000 gallons of water. (Bardauskas, 2021). This week I wanted to focus on team efforts to create new and better ideas for recycling.                          For this week to make sense I ...
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Module 5 Seek to Understand First

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  Welcome back my earth-loving recyclers. I know last week we focused on the amount of trash that can be recycled in a school. However, this week I wanted to review opposing issues that could hinder a school's recycling program. I found several articles that discussed the pros and cons of recycling in general and I wanted to take this week to focus on the cons associated with recycling in schools. For instance, some people argue that schools in rural areas might find it expensive to find someone to haul the recycled materials away (Bradley, 2012). Another quick note I found is that even though schools have a recycling program, they might not have the manpower or resources to manage the program. A teacher in New York City stated “ For him, on top of teaching multiple other science classes and modules like Astronomy and Astrobiology, being a sustainability coordinator isn’t a top priority ” (McGee, 2019).             It might b...
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Module 4 Win/Win for the world!

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              Welcome back my fellow recyclers! I assume if you are still with me then you have already contacted your schools in the local area. My goal here is still to raise awareness about the amounts of trash that can be recycled in American school districts. “This week I am to prove that Texas landfills will completely fill up within the next 56 years!” (Take Care of Texas, 2018) I aim to prove “You may end up saving your school money on waste disposal costs. Some school districts have saved thousands of dollars a year by implementing recycling programs.” (Take Care of Texas, 2018). Recycling is a Win/Win situation for all parties involved. Not only does it help with our landfills but also it helps protect our environment as stated in previous blog posts.             Not only should you care based on your values but also you should know its against Texas law to not ...
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Module 3 Putting First Things FIrst

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                 In this week’s blog post I want to focus on putting first things first. I want to take you through how Los Angeles the county is currently leading the way in the recycling efforts I have been discussing in my previous blog posts. On learninggreen.laschools.org they state “​Since 2015 we have focused on sustaining the existing recycling programs in 600+ schools (over 300 schools successfully continue with a full process lunch recycling program), shifting more schools to tray-stacking and milk-pouring as well as establishing food share programs during lunchtime.” (LAUSD, n.d.) This is a prime example of people putting recycling first these schools have gamified the recycling programs in their schools and even have healthy competitions amongst different schools.             As a future educator I hope we can learn from these schools and all the great things they are d...
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Module 2 Internal Compass

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  Welcome to the highly anticipated weekly blog. I am so glad to have you back for this week’s installment of green material. Today I focus on the results or the vision of these posts which illustrates the starting of school recycling programs across the United States. “Annual school waste totals well over 530,000 tons of food with a staggering 45 million gallons of milk also wasted. This leads to an estimated whopping $1.7 billion lost total.” (Neese, 2020) This continues on from our previous week's issue by showing the waste in just food products and also by restating our goal to reduce the amount of waste created at schools and prevent it from reaching landfills. The intent is to reach school teachers, administrators, and even directors of school districts. There are programs that exist to start recycling programs in schools and limit the waste sent to landfills such as thegreenteam.org. On their site, they state “Before a recycling program can be developed and implemented at ...
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Module 1 To Saving the Landfills

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  1.        Welcome everyone this blog will be used to show the grave amounts of waste created by schools when recycling could be used to help limit the unnecessary waste in our landfills. In a special study done in Minnesota they found “By extrapolation, this means an estimated 483,520 lb of waste are generated per day at Minnesota K-12 public schools.” (Control Agency, 2018) Furthermore, they found in that same research “Twenty-eight percent ( 28%) of school waste, by weight, could be diverted into the recycling stream.” (Control Agency, 2018) This is only in Minnesota but they recorded “Substantial components of the waste stream in Minnesota schools could be reduced, recycled or composted” (Control Agency, 2018) This problem is happening in Minnesota but is it also happening in your schools? I challenge you to find out! 2.       Why should you care? This is a question I receive a lot when it comes to recycling and landfills. On the ...
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