Tag Archives: environmentaleducation

White Plains Church St Elementary Students scavenge through environmental information

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We Future Cycle had the pleasure of taking 4th and 5th grade students of Church St. Elementary School in White Plains on an environmental Scavenger Hunt during indoor recess.  unnamed
The interest of the kids was immediately piqued by our colorful “Did you know?” posters.  The posters are filled with many details about our impact on the environment including how Westchester County disposes of all of our waste, the effect of plastics on our environment and effects of processing of aluminum.
The students would scavenge through all of the information on the posters and find the clues needed to complete a questionnaire. They were eager participants and very proud to be able to find the answers.
Asked at the end of the activity if they learned anything new, every participant answered with a resounding “YES!”.  All in all a great success…the kids had a lot of fun while learning a great deal.

New Rochelle Ward Green Team makes recycling posters to educate the whole school

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New Rochelle Ward Elementary school has a bustling green team, comprised of 35 3rd, 4th and 5th graders under the leadership of the Science teacher David Nodiff. It is a coveted position to be part of the green team and students actually have to write an essay at the beginning of the year to become part of it and not every applicant makes it.

Lunchroom recycling station helpers are members of the green team and they make sure that K and 1 students are sorting correctly. With great pride, gloves and a badge around their neck, they are making sure all material goes into the correct bin.

In order to help with the classroom and building wide recycling system, the green team decided to make a series of posters explaining some of the trickier details to the whole school through captive audience education. On stairs, where students are often lined up in an orderly fashion, with some delays if there is “traffic”, students tend to look around and Green Team students have now strategically placed information posters at these locations.

And it is working!

Students now know that only hard plastic items go into the green commingled bins. Soft plastic items like wrappers or baggies go into the trash. All paper and cardboard can go into the blue bin for paper recycling.

Thank you Ward Green Team for educating the whole school community!

 

New Rochelle Davis Elementary School replaces thousands of single use water cups with reusable bottles

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Some of New Rochelle’s buildings have these stylish water fountains, where kids got a little cup if they wanted a drink.

New Rochelle Davis Elementary School decided to do something about these 1000 of paper cups and and under the leadership of Principal Anthony Brambrola and the PTA, every child was supplied with a reusable water bottle, decorated with the Davis Dolphin to encourage reusable rather then single serve when it came to going to one of their temporary water dispensers in the hallways.

This has cut down on the usage of literally thousands of small paper cups per day.

Thank you Davis PTA for investing not only in the water bottles, but also bringing this kind of sustainable thinking to the fabric of the school.

 

White Plains Post Rd students participate in Environmental Scavenger Hunt

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We Future Cycle had the pleasure of taking the 4th grade students of Post Road Elementary School in White Plains on an environmental Scavenger Hunt.

Outside of the lunchroom, We Future Cycle representatives set up a series of colorful “Did you know?” posters  which outlined with graphic pictures environmental issues and what can be done by everybody to help.

Students got a detective sheet and searched for clues on the posters, all the while learning  many details about how everyday behavior impacts our environment. They stared at the mind boggling number of 500 million straws used every single day in the US alone, while cringing at the picture of a poor loggerhead turtle with a straw in her nose. They expressed shock seeing the mountain of garbage floating in our oceans due to litter on land getting washed into the water ways. And they all learned, that everything we do matters. Small everyday behavior changes can make a big impact.

The students read through all of the information and were able to answer all of the questions.  We had quite a few Girl Scout members participate!  Math teacher Ms. Schmidt came by and was very interested in how the posters gave the kids a way of understanding math principles such as percentages and other relative values.

Indeed, a very successful day of Scavenger Hunting at Post Road Elementary.    Post Road Elementary School is participating in the We Future Cycle recycling program for 3 years now and all students are total pros when it comes to sorting their lunch waste into compostable, recyclable and non recyclable materials, thus reducing their waste by a whopping 97%.

These kind of games help connect their hands to their hearts, making them lifelong agents of change in their communities.

 

New Rochelle Jefferson students have fun hunting for environmental clues

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We Future Cycle had the pleasure of taking the 4th and 5th grade students of Jefferson Elementary School in New Rochelle on an environmental Scavenger Hunt.

The students were eager participants and it was a huge success!

12 colorful boards were highlighting a series of environmental problems with some shocking data and pictures. Students read through the  “Did you know?” posters and and while searching for clues, learned many details about their impact on the environment.

They learned just how Westchester County disposes of all of our waste by burning it into our air. They learned the effect of plastics on our environment and how bits of plastics end up in our marine animals and ultimately killing them. And they learned about the shocking environmental destruction that is caused by aluminum  mining, all so we can wrap our sandwich ?! -shudder- 

The students would scavenge through all of the information and find the answers to the questions on the questionnaire.  We Future Cycle representatives guided students through the activity, helping them with difficult words and inviting them to think deeper into the topic.  Students were very proud to finish the questionnaire and had a lot of fun while learning a great deal. Even though the activity was geared toward 4th and 5th grade, some 3rd graders were very excited to participate ….

Bringing environmental education through play to the students will ensure the longevity of the recycling program that is run in the lunchroom. Every day, students carefully sort their lunchwaste into compostable, recyclable and non recyclable materials, thus diverting a whopping 97% of their waste from the trash. Because if the heart knows why something is done, it is easy for the hands to do it.

 

New Rochelle Isaac Young’s Green Team in motion

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New Rochelle School District is running the We Future Cycle recycling program for over 6 years now, working its way up the grades. First all the elementary schools then the middle schools and lastly the highschool 2 years ago. Together, 11.500 students are sorting their waste every single day. In the lunchroom and in their classrooms.

Isaac E Young MS has a vibrant Green Team and under the leadership of their Green Team coordinator as well as the head custodian William Coleman, a well oiled recycling machine was created.

20190125_143655Twice per week, teachers put out in the hallway their blue and green recycling bins with carefully sorted materials. Green Team students grab large rolling toters and go from classroom to classroom to collect the materials for recycling.

It creates ownership of the process for the building, the custodial staff appreciates the help and is sponsoring a pizza party for green team members on a regular basis and the kids feel empowered to be part of the solution. A win-win all around. We Future Cycle is proud to be part of this process.

White Plains Post Rd Students working hard to support recycling

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White Plains School district has adopted the We Future Cycle recycling program 4 years ago and most of their elementary school population has now seen only to carefully sort their lunchwaste into compostable, recyclable and non recyclable materials. Achieving everyday a 97% reduction.

Post Rd was particularly successful reducing its garbage from 277 lbs per lunch to a mere 5 lbs. Here is a picture of the proud principal Jessie Ossorio after the first lunch with just one fluffy little bag.

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Post Road elementary schools bright and inviting lunchroom welcomes 2 grades at a time to the right and the left of the center aisle. Each grade has their own recycling station and students are invited by the head custodian Rob Dell’Orletta to come up and help at the station, once done with eating.

And boy…. do they take him up on that offer. Every single lunch period, especially the littlest grades are eager to help and shoulder to shoulder they are standing to help their classmates through the process. Mr Dell’Orletta just smiles and confirms that this is an every day event.

It is heartwarming to see these eager faces, their unflinching commitment to the cause, calling Mr Dell’Orletta over when a classmate made a mistake and they cannot reach the offending material to remove.  When I asked them what they were doing, they answered “we are saving the world”, and sure thing! that is what these troopers are doing, every single day.

New Rochelle Barnard students are detectives of packaging material

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New Rochelle Barnard students are fabulous waste sorters. The whole school populations has never seen anything but carefully separating their lunch waste into excess liquid, food waste, and recyclable and non-recyclable packaging.

Students know to walk up to the recycling station after lunch and sort their left overs, under the caring and watchful eye of Nick, the lunchroom cleaner.

Recently, We Future Cycle presenters were invited to play some more with the students all around sustainability and material identification.

Knowing what is recyclable and what not is the key to doing it right. Wishful recycling, as in just putting stuff into the green bin, is actually counter productive and creates many problems at the material recovery facility in Yonkers.

Students sat in front of a large pile of common packaging material of all types and were playfully “helping” the presenter to place the items into the correct bin. Most rigid packaging materials made out of plastics, aluminum, carton or glass are fully recyclable in Westchester County.

We Future Cycle shared with the adults in the room that Styrofoam contains Styrene, which is now a classified human carcinogen and banned in New York City, with legislation on the books in Albany to make it a state wide ban.

Students also learned that it is easy to avoid making trash. We Future Cycle presenters shared with them just how much they personally did not like to create trash.

Students learned that -oh big surprise- gold fish taste the same if they are packaged in a plastic zip lock baggie or in a reusable container. After learning about where the trash goes and that baggies end up in the trash, every single one of them responsibly voted that reusable containers are a much better choice for our world.

A harder sell were juice pouches. Juice pouches are one of the worst packaging offenders in existence. Valuable aluminum foil is sandwiched between two layers of plastic. Unrecyclable and thus adding to the whopping 2500 tons of trash generated in Westchester County every single day. All for 2 min of sugar laced drink. Students learned and agreed, that a reusable water bottle is a much better idea for our world.

 

 

Why Recycling and Energy Efficiency go hand in hand….. to save our Earth

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We Future Cycle is working actively in the New Rochelle schools to educate students about recycling and material management. Students are sorting their lunch waste every day and by now it is normal business. They know that plastics go in that bin, food and paper goes over there and only soft plastics are placed in trash.
They learned they are diverting 97% of their waste. In the elementary schools, these reduction numbers don’t really get a wow from the students, but from middle school on, there is the dawning of some understanding of the scope. Students also learn in classroom session what happens to the different materials that they sort out. These presentation really cement that sorting will become second nature and transfers to other times in their lives.
We Future Cycle is now including energy efficiency awareness training, afterall energy efficiency is effectively the REDUCE in the 3 Rs.
27625287_1711151925595102_1401935894197184112_oBecause of course, Energy efficiency is nothing else than energy management on a personal level. Energy that is being created at environmental cost, provided  and used, but ultimately wasted is a burden on our pocket book and a burden on the environment.
Energize New Rochelle can help home owners to assess their own homes in terms of how energy efficient they are. We all are spending a significant amount per month to heat and cool our homes and on average, we could save 30% of that cost by following some simple steps.
Learn more about how you can become energy efficient and save money (and save the environment) by signing up for a free or reduced cost Home Energy Assessment with Energize New Rochelle.

 

Saving the environment and our pocket book goes hand in hand.

New Rochelle Ward School recycles boxes and boxes of markers

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Once a week, a swarm of green team students are fanning out over the New Rochelle Ward Elementary building to collect used up markers from each classroom.

Students have learned that most materials can be recycled if they are just sorted properly and under the leadership of Mr Nodiff, the science teacher,  boxes and boxes of markers are diverted from the incinerator to be shipped to Crayola for recycling.

Never underestimate kid power when it comes to creating change!