Inside a school that recycles two-thirds of its trash
Eyestone Elementary School goes through a lot of milk cartons, and even more paper.
Those are the two most prolific items recycled at the Wellington school, a leader in Poudre School District’s recycling program that diverts about two-thirds of its trash from landfills.
The success has a lot to do with head custodian Brian Harrison and a team of devoted fifth graders who help him sort and dump trash during lunch.
“It’s always been a passion of mine to leave a legacy for our kids,” said Harrison, whose son Carter is in third grade at Eyestone.
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When Harrison became head custodian at Eyestone about six years ago, he revamped the school’s lunchroom routine. Instead of a free-for-all where kids dump their trash in a bin and scram, students shuffle through a line with trays in hand. Harrison, stationed behind a long table, helps each student figure out what to recycle from their lunch.
Emptied milk cartons are recycled, along with aluminum cans, plastic fruit cups and Lunchables trays, among other things. Until the composting program was cut because of costs this year, students also sorted out food waste for composting.
The structure is important for kids as young as 5 years old.
“When they start out, there’s so many steps, it can get a little bit confusing,” Harrison said. “With some kids, what they learned early on in their life was just to throw everything away, and it’s hard to break that.”
Eventually, kids get the hang of it and recycling becomes second nature.
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“They probably don’t think too much about it — it’s just part of the routine, which is what we want,” Eyestone Principal David Sobson said.
Two of Harrison’s fifth-grade helpers said they like recycling because it’s fun — and because it “make(s) the world a better place to live in,” 10-year-old Matthew Jimenez said.
“It can’t just all be thrown away,” added 10-year-old Marcelino Quintana. “It could be used for something else.”
Outside the cafeteria, every classroom has a container for recyclables. It took some time to integrate recycling in the entire building, Sobson said, but the process has been worth it.
And the kids are on board.
“They’re excited about it,” Harrison said. “If you come into the lunchroom, it’s pretty obvious they’re a happy group of kiddos.”
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Top PSD schools for trash diversion, 2015-2016 school year
- Wellington Middle School: 73.3 percent of trash diverted from landfills (40 percent recycled, 33 percent composted)
- Lopez Elementary: 73 percent of trash diverted from landfills (40 percent recycled, 32 percent composted)
- Eyestone Elementary: 72 percent of trash diverted from landfills (52 percent recycled, 20 percent composted)
- Beattie Elementary: 70 percent of trash diverted from landfills (31 percent recycled, 39 percent composted)
- Polaris Lab School: 67.1 percent of trash diverted from landfills (39 percent recycled, 29 percent composted)
PSD’s overall landfill diversion rate by weight: 45.3 percent
Note: PSD eliminated its composting program this year when pick-up costs doubled. Eyestone now recycles about 65 percent of its trash, and school leaders hope to bring back composting in the future.