Energy bar Wrappers Don't Go Into the Garbage at Noble School

Energy Bar Wrappers Don’t Go Into the Garbage at Noble School

San Jose’s Noble School Diverts More than 78,000 Pieces of Trash from the Landfill
and Raises Funds, Using a Program that Started with Worm Poop

 

SAN JOSE, CA – Energy bar wrappers, empty glue sticks, warn out pens and used cell phones never get into the garbage cans at Noble School in San Jose, CA, where students and parents working together diverted more than 78,000 items from going into the landfill and raised $1,400 in the process.

 

Through a company and program called TerraCycle, Noble Elementary School decided to put into place schoolwide colorful trash cans featuring “Capri Sun” pouches, Nabisco wrappers, tape dispensers and stuff like that to train the entire student body around terracycling as opposed to tossing into the trash.

 

"Our students have really gotten into the philosophy of saving the planet one piece of garbage at a time," says Manju Ramachandran, 2011-2012 Noble PTA president. "The school has accomplished so much, and students and parents alike became very creative at increasing our Terracycle results. We could not have succeeded so quickly without parents Telma Rangel and Season Barrientos, who run the program tirelessly."

 

“Noble Elementary School’s efforts to keep non-recyclable products and packaging out of the local landfill are fantastic,” said Lauren Taylor, director of U.S. public relations for TerraCycle.  “It’s terrific to see students are concerned enough about their community and the environment to take the time each day to collect, sort and send us what would normally be garbage.”

Noble School won TerraCycle’s contest for sending in the greatest number of cheese wrappers in May among all public schools in the United States.

 

TerraCycle was founded in 2001 by Tom Szaky, then a 20-year-old Princeton University freshman. TerraCycle (www.TerraCycle.net) began by producing organic fertilizer, packaging liquid worm poop in used soda bottles. Since then TerraCycle has grown into one of the fastest growing green companies in the world.

At Noble School, the results of the TerraCycle program came in very quickly. The janitors noticed approximately two big garbage cans each day were not getting filled at lunch time. Here is a snapshot of the results for the year-long efforts. These items were all diverted from the waste stream:

·         78, 000 total pieces of stuff

·         32,486 drink pouches

·         13,105 baggies (or home storage containers)

·         9,583 energy bar wrappers

·         3813 candy wrappers

·         2,587 plastic lunch kits

·         832 Colgate toothpaste tubes or brushes

·         455 writing instruments (pens)

·         583 yogurt cups

Noble Elementary School was recognized by the city of San Jose for the good work. “I would like to take this opportunity to commend Noble School Elementary for their efforts to protect the earth and reduce the amount of waste going into our landfills.  Noble Elementary is a shining example of environmental stewardship, demonstrating outstanding leadership in raising environmental consciousness in the City of San José,” said Councilman Kansen Chu Friday.

 

TerraCycle’s purpose is to eliminate the idea of waste. They do this by creating national recycling systems for the previously non-recyclable items. The process starts by offering collection programs (many of them free) to collect waste and then convert the collected waste into a wide range of products and materials. With over 14 million people collecting waste in 11 countries together it has diverted billions of pieces of waste that are either upcycled or recycled into over 1,500 various products available at retailers ranging from Walmart to Whole Foods Market. The vision is to eliminate the idea of waste by creating collection and solution systems for anything that today ends up in our trash.

 

Noble Elementary School is a k-5 school in the Berryessa Union School District with a student population of over 600 from a wide spectrum of ethnic and demographic backgrounds.

The school will start TerraCycle again in August with renewed enthusiasm. “We do this whether or not we earn money for our school, we are still saving the earth and teaching our children great values, and to be green every day,” says Telma Rangel, one of two parents who run the program at Noble Elementary. To get involved with TerraCycle for your group, you can go to www.TerraCycle.net.