“Recycle, Reduce, Reuse and Close the loop…”
Plenty of kids will recognize this YouTube hit about recycling sung by the spokesdinosaur Recycle Rex. And from Mister Rogers’ Neighborhood® to Sesame Street®, children continue to be exposed to messages about recycling starting in early childhood. Is this early education influencing behavior for the better? We think so.
Recently in Denver, Colorado, high school students took matters into their own hands and responded to the first annual Global Call to Action Challenge, sponsored by the Pearson Foundation and PeaceJam. The Challenge, which encourages youth to positively impact their communities and document their achievements in digital film or writing, inspired students at Ponderosa High School to design a recycling project that reduced the school’s waste by 70 percent and energy consumption by 14 percent.
After conducting an energy audit of the school to help identify opportunities to reduce waste, the students worked with community organizations to hold an electronics recycling drive where they collected more than 120,000 pounds of unwanted equipment and kept it out of landfills. Thrilled with the success of the students’ efforts, organizers of the Challenge commended their dedication and achievements.
Today, many organizations – from nonprofits to federal and state government – are taking steps to capture the enthusiasm of this age group. Below are a few examples of online resources:
• State of Pensylvania – Just for Kids Recycling
• The Association of Postconsumer Plastics Recyclers -Kids Recycling Zone
• EPA’s Environmental Kids Club – Garbage and Recycling
• National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences: Reduce, Reuse, Recycle
Children and youth everywhere are able to adopt recycling as a cause of their own. Whether they are participating in school recycling drives, creating craft projects with recycled materials, or making sure their parents remember to recycle their plastics, cans and newspapers, today’s young people are standing up for the environment.
