Tag Archives: recycling

Senator George Latimer Visits We Future Cycle School Recycling Implementation

May 6, 2015 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

Five eager 5th graders from the Blind Brook’s BMP Ridge Street Elementary school’s Green Team were very proud to present the results from the recent implementation of the We Future Cycle School Recycling Program to Senator George Latimer, BOE President Jeff Diamond and Rye Town Councilwoman Christina Collins.

Everybody listened attentively as the students described how they conducted a waste audit in the lunchroom and learned that Ridge St Elementary school regularly generated 12 large garbage bags weighing a total of 186lbs and Senator Latimer expressed amazement when they shared with him that after source separation only 8lbs of trash are remaining (4% of the total waste). All the other materials are diverted into recycling and composting.

Senator Latimer was also interested in learning how this program could be brought to additional Westchester County schools.

The Blind Brook Board of Education was instrumental in getting the district to adopt the We Future Cycle program and BOE President Jeff Diamond was very pleased to see the system up and running so amazingly well. Councilwoman Christina Collins, who also chairs the Rye Town Sustainability Initiative, has been supportive of the program from the first moment she heard about it and is delighted to see it in action. The Blind Brook PTA sponsored the program in the district, and many PTA members volunteered during the first few weeks to get everything running smoothly. Thank you to everyone for the support!

Larchmont Green Expo, A Great Success

March 24, 2015 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

We Future Cycle had a vendor table at the Larchmont Green Expo, what a wonderful event. It was very well attended and many visitor were very interested in what we are doing.

Ashley was using magic to lure them to our table (we had a plate with Girl Scout cookies……) and while munching they learned about the program.

Simultaneously we ran a recycling sorting game for the children, and it was very heart warming to see how much some children already knew.

We Future Cycle Joined Forces with Creative Change Educational Solutions to Bring STEM Based Environmental Education Into The Classroom

March 24, 2015 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

Creative Change Educational Solutions Founder and Executive Director Susan Satone asked herself in 2002:

What do you do if you’re a teacher and everything you’re passionate about is largely absent from the curriculum?

This is the dilemma I faced more than 20 years ago when I was teaching in the public schools. I had discovered sustainability through the issue of world hunger and was desperately searching for a way to bring these issues into my teaching. I wanted to inspire students and develop their skills in addressing global issues. And that’s when I decided to start Creative Change. I wanted to build an organization focused on supporting educators to teach effectively about sustainability. I wanted to equip people with quality curriculum that supports inquiry, engagement and action.

We Future Cycle’s mission is to bring sustainability awareness to students, as young as kindergarten. Children can learn that their choices, their actions count and can make a big difference. We know that doing hands-on source separation in the lunchroom needs to be backed up with class room activities. We created the 2 week “Bash the Trash” program where a 10 day curriculum is tying each step of the program into ELA, Math, Social Studies and Science.

Creative Change Educational Solutions graciously supplied us with cutting edge, STEM oriented lesson units, helping teachers to incorporate sustainability education into the mainstream curriculum.

For more information on Creative Change Educational Solutions, go to CREATIVECHANGE.NET

Pelham’s Colonial School In The Pelham Weekly Newspaper For Making A Difference

February 7, 2015 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

Colonial Fifth Graders Challenge School To “Bash The Trash”

Colonial’s fifth graders recently challenged the school to “Bash the Trash” and go litterless at lunch, reducing the trash collected every day. Parents were urged to use recyclable containers for food and drink (containers that could be returned home, washed and reused). At the end of the challenge, the fifth graders plan to tell the school how much the trash was reduced, based on data they collected. Their hope is to leave a “littlerless legacy” at Colonial when they graduate.

Please see full published “The Pelham Weekly” article here:

http://www.pelhamplus.com/news/schools/collection_b8f059da-ac9e-11e4-a787-2f29c82bf329.html

We Future Cycle and The Science Barge Teaming up for local Elementary school

February 6, 2015 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

We Future Cycle and The Science Barge are teaming up to bring environmental education and hands-on every day source separation to a local elementary school. The program is sponsored by the school’s PTA and championed by the principal.

Jennifer Sloan, Director of Education of The Science Barge, gave the introductory presentation to the students. Neatly sitting and attentive were 150 students ranging from Kindergarten to 5th grade, listening to the fascinating story of garbage through times.

Slide From Ms Sloan's presentation — Slide From Ms Sloan’s presentation

Did you know there were once “Piggeries” in New York? Pigs were kept in Central Park and were let out at night to roam the city and eat the garbage off the streets. The kids were giggling to no end when the presentation included a cartoon piggy, um, leaving its own waste on the street, illustrating that pigs roaming the street may not be the best waste management solution after all!

Ms. Sloan very skillfully and with great energy combined science with social studies explaining what garbage is, why it is a problem, and how kids can be empowered to tackle this problem. It was heart-warming to see how attentive and engaged the students were to her presentation.

We Future Cycle guided the students through a Waste Audit as well as a Waste Analysis. Students counted, charted, weighed and identify what waste is being generated at school.

After establishing the current waste situation, the students helped setting up a recycling station to sort the materials into left over liquid, milk cartons, commingled, compost, trays and remaining trash.

It was eye-opening for students and staff to see the mountains of untouched food sorted out, that was normally going straight in the garbage. In this school with 300 students, there were 63 pieces of fruit, 73 pre-packaged vegetables, 15 apple sauce containers and 3 milks completely untouched. We Future Cycle is now helping this school to donate this food to a local agency.

The wonderfully supportive custodial staff was all aghast to see that their usual 10 bags of garbage was reduced to 1/4 bag of loose softplastic and single service wrappers. All the rest went into recycling, composting or reusable avenues.

FiOS1 News Story on We Future Cycle Program in Hastings

January 16, 2015 wefuturecycle 2 Comments

We Future Cycle is proud to be featured on FiOS 1 News by reporter Christina Chiarelli, who was on site at Hastings’ Hillside Elementary School. Ms. Chiarelli spoke with the school’s head custodian, George Giannone, aide Kim Osborne, and many students about how the program has dramatically reduced lunchroom waste.

As well, interviews with the students’ demonstrated how much they have learned about recycling from participating in the program! Hands-on recycling and composting give kids a tangible understanding of how their actions have an impact on the environment.

Watch the broadcast by clicking here or on the image below:

WCBS AM 880 Covers Hastings-on-Hudson’s Implementation of We Future Cycle

January 12, 2015 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

Sean Adams of WCBS radio recently covered the We Future Cycle implementation at Hastings-on-Hudson schools, featuring We Future Cycle founder Anna Giordano, Hastings’ Hillside Elementary School Assistant Principal Farid Johnson, Facilities Director George Prine, and Food Service Director Alan Levin.

Read and listen to the WCBS AM 880 story here.

Environmental Goals for Westchester in 2015, let’s do this!

January 1, 2015 wefuturecycle 2 Comments

With 2014 being such an incredible year we are looking forward to 2015 and the positive change it can bring to Westchester schools.

My personal wish list for 2015 is

1. Implementing We Future Cycle’s School Lunch and Building-Wide Recycling and Composting Program to 10 More School Districts in 2015, even if it is just in one pilot school per district. Implementing these programs is very do-able, but working with experts is critical to ensure a successful implementation. Results will speak for themselves and that will hopefully lead to district-wide implementation in many Westchester School districts.

Just imagine, if one school reduces its garbage from 22 bags per day down to less then 1/4 bag per day, what kind of impact this will have if 10 more districts will join the program. And just imagine all those students going back home to their parents and sharing their enthusiasm to save the world.

2. Creating the First Leaf and Food-Waste Composting Site in Westchester. So far, only very few communities are composting their leaves, most are trucking them to Rockland County at great expense in fossil fuel consumption, labor and heavy equipment on our streets. So far, no community is doing larger scale, organized food waste composting instead nature’s valuable resource is treated as trash, plastic bagged and burnt. The good news is that several communities are now studying how to solve this problem. We are proud to be on the forefront with them.

3. Integrating Sustainability Education into Curriculum. We have done numerous environmental projects with individual schools such as green writing contests, waste free snack education, TerraCycle Ambassador programs, kindergarten recycling sorting games and it shows again and again, that when students are made aware early of their personal ability to create environmental change, that the ripple effect through the community is amazing.

2014….Giving Thanks To Great Opportunities for Environmental Change in Westchester

December 31, 2014 wefuturecycle Leave a comment

2014 was an action-packed year for We Future Cycle. We are looking proudly upon multiple TV, radio and other news outlet coverage stories of the environmental programs that we offer.

We thank New Rochelle’s Interim Superintendent, Dr. Jeffrey Korostoff, for boldly going where no one had gone before by fully supporting the program and implementing it in all of New Rochelle’s Elementary Schools.

We thank Maureen Caraballo, Treasurer for Hastings-on-Hudson School District, for being the major force to bring the program to Hastings’ schools.

We thank Paul Feiner, Supervisor of the Town of Greenburgh, for endorsing us to bring the program to all of Greenburgh’s school districts.

We thank the White Plains Sustainability Committee to endorse us and to recommend the program to White Plains schools. We are very pleased and excited to be presenting this program to the White Plains Administration in January.

We thank the City Council of New Rochelle for endorsing We Future Cycle programs and for working with us to bring the first Food Waste Composting Site to Westchester.

We thank Joseph Carvin, Supervisor of the Town of Rye, for endorsing the program and affiliating with us. Mr. Carvin is also founder of the organization “One World, United & Virtuous.”

We thank Catherine Parker, Westchester County Legislator and Chair of the Committee for Environment and Energy, for featuring our program at the Board of Legislators and the Westchester Environmental Summit, as well as for her continuous and outspoken support. She is the major force behind creating a Westchester-based solution for food waste composting.

We thank the Columbia University Capstone Program for recommending the implementation of the We Future Cycle School recycling program as part of the Zero Waste Initiative to the Town of Mamaroneck, Village of Mamaroneck, and the Village of Larchmont.

We thank the Greenburgh Nature Center for offering a meeting venue to present the program as well as many other earth-saving and thought-provoking environmental presentations.

We thank County Legislator Sheila Marcotte and James Maisano for honoring us with a Proclamation for creating and implementing the program at New Rochelle Trinity School. New Rochelle’s Trinity Elementary School is truly a leader, one of the first schools to implement with an exceptional administration.

We thank the Pelham Sustainability Committee EcoPel for featuring the program and for their efforts to bring it to the Pelham schools.

We thank the Westchester Municipal Offcials Association for endorsing the program and bringing it back as recommendation to their communities.

We thank all the people that support us in our work to bring sustainability and environmental education into the schools as a daily learning experience, so we can raise environmentally-literate children.

Charles Kettering said these famous words: “The world hates change, yet is has been the only thing that brought progress.” We could not agree more.

Larchmont /Mamaroneck Zero Waste Initiative Recommends We Future Cycle School Recycling Program

December 11, 2014 wefuturecycle 1 Comment

On December 9th, 2014 representatives of the Village of Mamaroneck, Village of Larchmont and Town of Mamaroneck were listening to a very informative and well structured presentation by the Columbia University Masters in Sustainability Capstone Program. The kick off was a presentation by Mitch Green, Town Liaison, explaining how this presentation came about and thanking the Capstone team for choosing Larchmont/Mamaroneck as their project.

The team then laid out the “have and have nots” of the towns, slides showed the percentages of yard waste, curb side recyclables recovered, as well as total garbage collected. The towns are already exceptionally well positioned with a 63% recycling rate, which is the combination of yard waste and curbside recycling. The goal however is getting to 90%. The team showed several areas of opportunity, which are comprised of textile recycling, food waste composting, “Pay-as-you-throw” and getting the schools involved.

The team outlined that schools and the children within them are the key to changed behavior and their recommendation is to get the We Future Cycle Program into the schools to start that process. Parents learn from their children, as much as the other way around.

The 100+ page report will be posted as soon as it becomes available.