Success story: Emerald Park Elementary School
School District: Kent
School Location: Kent
Began participating in the Green Schools Program: September 2010
Level One of the Green Schools Program: Achieved in May 2011
Waste reduction and recycling
- Emerald Park started a student green team in 2010. This group led school-wide efforts to expand the school’s recycling practices.
- The school’s recycling rate is 43 percent.
- Green team students assist with recycling activities in the lunchroom, where milk cartons, plastic bottles, aluminum cans, and hot lunch trays are collected to be recycled.
- Recycling containers and signs in each classroom and office help students and staff to recycle.
- To reduce waste, the district eliminated straws and replaced the plastic wrapped sets of utensils, napkins and straws with individual sporks and napkins that students can obtain from dispensers. Designed to protect health, the dispensers release sporks and napkins one at a time so that each utensil and napkin is handled by only one child.
- With student participation and with support from custodian John Sweet, numerous teachers, and lunchroom supervisors Carol Albanese, Jennifer Lobdell, Judy Lewis and Kathryn Britt, Emerald Park has an effective waste reduction and recycling program.
- Posters and bulletin boards throughout the school encourage students to recycle and look for new ways to reduce waste, reuse items, and recycle.
Comments
“It was encouraging to find that most students were aware of recycling and its benefit to our earth. They are quite savvy and willing to ask about whether or not an item can be recycled. The lunchroom recycling program is student driven. Older students assist and supervise younger students to teach and encourage more recycling in the lunchroom. Students are responsible for recycling and for emptying classroom recycling containers. We see that our students appreciate the opportunity to make a difference.”
– Carol Albanese, lunchroom supervisor
For more information about the school’s conservation achievements and participation in the Green Schools Program, contact:
Dean Ficken, principal
Dean.Ficken@kent.k12.wa.us