Students find recycling pays

ALBANY —— A recycling program implemented by 10 eighth-graders has not only cut school waste in half, it has won them a national award and has made the city take notice.

The Desmond
gators Going Green, members of the science club at St. Teresa of Avila School, put in place a paper recycling program that won first place in the Lexus Eco Challenge, a national contest for middle and high school students to learn about the environment and take a stand to improve it.

The science club at the grammar school had been recycling for about a year, when science teacher Laura Salewski suggested the students enter the challenge. The students wrote their action plan, which included ideas to improve the community's recycling program and details on how to achieve it. The teacher worked with them and guided them.

"Miss Salewski found Greenfiber, a company that uses recycled paper to create insulation. A representative came in and gave us information about recycling," said cailin mckenna, a member of the science club. A couple of weeks later, the company delivered a big green bin for recycled materials.

The students created fliers about recycling paper and distributed them to the parish community and also included them with the church bulletin. "We scheduled a day in October for the parish community to drop off paper. Also, we talked to the younger students about environment and waste and about recycling at home and in school," said mckenna. Other science club members include Allison House, Ashley Evola, Clare Herubin, Carmen Hubert, cailin mckenna, Theresa rubi, Innah Bisquera, and Summer Clevenger, all of Albany; and Jen dumond of rensselaer. (Welch is no longer in the club.)

"The Greenfiber bin is installed outside the school and is bigger than the school dumpster. Every other Wednesday someone from the company picks up the paper and weighs it. In two months, we have recycled four tons of paper. Previously, all that paper used to go in our dumpster!," mckenna said. For each ton of paper it recycles, the school receives $25.

As part of their project, the gators Going Green also created a Web site, http://www.freewebs.com/gatorsgoinggreen.

Their efforts have had an impact beyond their school, propelling the city of Albany's Department of General Services to hire a recycling specialist. The city is even considering building a plant in Albany rather than shipping recyclables elsewhere.

Sixteen teams in 12 states were awarded $10,000 each in the contest for their outstanding entries in the Protecting the Land Challenge, the first of three initial challenges. Each team can participate in the final challenge for a chance at $50,000.

"We did not initially tell the children about the money involved," said Sister Patricia Houlihan, school principal. Everyone was thrilled to win, and to learn that the prize money was $10,000.

Of the money, "$2,000 goes to the school, $1,000 to the teacher, and each of us (students) gets $700," said mckenna.

Sister Patricia said "Most parents allowed the children to buy one thing with their share of the money. They put the rest of the money toward saving."

mckenna put her share of the prize money toward college savings. "I plan to study science," she said.

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Tuesday, December 30, 2008 |

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