Students give school board a lesson in recycling

Posted: 2:32 pm, January 21, 2014 by Publisher Scott Brennan

Georgia Brown Elementary students demonstrate their new lunch-time recycling routine to school board members.

Students from Georgia Brown Elementary school visited the Paso Robles Joint Unified School District board last week and showcased a new recycling program they started this year.

Victoria Carranza of One Cool Earth

Victoria Carranza, who works for One Cool Earth, a non-profit that is dedicated to tree planting and recycling programs, introduced the school’s Green Team. It’s a group of more than a dozen students who helped start this new campus-wide recycling program. So far the team has cut waste by 50 percent and saved the school $315 a month.

The Green Team began this school year in September by measuring the school’s baseline waste with a waste audit. They next began educational sessions with the students. They distributed new blue recycling bins to be paired up with every gray regular trash bin. They installed six macrobins for worm composting.

They created a waste station for after lunch disposal that is supervised by student peers and volunteers. The disposal process was demonstrated for the school board members with a group of students on the Green Team to show how the program works. It begins by dumping liquids, recyclables, compostable material, trash and ends with stacking trays.

At the school board meeting, Georgia Brown Elementary School Principal Ellalina Emrich Keller took the opportunity to address two concerns facing the school.

One is the recent drop in mathematics scores for fourth and fifth graders. Another area of concern is the merging of the new federal Common Core Curriculum standards with the school’s dual immersion program.

She said the school is addressing the concerns with the use of weekly “power hours.” Power hours are focused, small group learning sessions for students. She also said the school is focusing on the new “3 Rs” in education: Relationship between the teacher and students, Rigor is academics and Relevance of the lessons.