Although budgets are often tight, creative principals, teachers, and students have implemented successful environmental programs in schools throughout New York City. Presented with the task of preparing students for higher education, for jobs, and for life, all teachers, administrators, and teaching assistants are in a position to help our children become good stewards of the environment and to lead by example. The determined, environmentally aware students are our future educators, administrators, scientists and environmental leaders and we owe them the opportunity to learn, explore, and understand how our actions today may affect our world tomorrow and forever. The several million children in the NYC public and private school systems generate significant quantities of waste each day of the school year. The major components of the NYC school's waste stream include food service items such as polystyrene single-use lunch trays, disposable plates, flatware, milk cartons, steel containers, plastic jugs and bottles, plastic film, and uneaten food.
Schools also generate significant quantities of white and mixed paper and cardboard.
Facility maintenance and general cleaning activities also generate waste. Schools may want to focus on waste prevention opportunities targeting food service and paper waste, since these areas represent the greatest quantities of waste. One of the first priorities is to ensure that your school has an effective recycling program in place, and, then identify opportunities for enhanced recycling. The next step is to identify the school operations where you can make the changes at the local level, by working with your school administration, custodial engineers, teachers, and parent-teacher organization. You may not be able to eliminate thousands of polystyrene trays because you do not have a dishwasher to wash reusable trays, but you may be able to offer students the option of not taking a tray.