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Success Story: Cedar River Middle School
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Steps to success
Footprints on the floor guide students through three lunchroom stations:
Station 1: Students empty liquids into gray buckets, place empties into recycling containers, and recycle Capri Sun containers and chip bags.
Station 2: Students place garbage in containers.
Station 3: Students place food scraps and other compostable materials into composting containers and then stack empty trays.
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School District: Tahoma
School Location: Maple Valley
Began participating in the Green Schools Program: October 2007
Level One of the Green Schools Program: Achieved in November 2009
Level Two of the Green Schools Program: Achieved in June 2010
Waste Reduction and Recycling
- Cedar River Middle School achieved a recycling rate of 43 percent by improving classroom recycling and by starting a recycling program for plastic bottles, aluminum cans, and milk and juice cartons.
- After starting to use online resources for project work, the school reduced its newspaper subscriptions from 500 daily to none. In 2007, a 40 percent recycling rate was buoyed by the 500 newspaper subscriptions arriving daily, many destined for the recycling bin without being opened.
- The school also started to recycle lunchroom food scraps that are collected for composting. As a result, lunchroom garbage volume was reduced from eight cans per day to two cans per day.
- The school set up a battery recycling program and also signed up with TerraCycle to collect the following items for recycling: Capri-Sun pouches and chip bags in the lunchroom, and Scotch tape dispensers and cores in the staff lounge.
- The school created a student Green Team with 40 regular members. Students created the Green Team motto “Don’t be mean, Go Green!”
- The Green Team held a school-wide logo contest in which the top three entries were recognized with prizes. All artwork was displayed on video and in the main hallway.
- For Earth Week in April 2009 the Green Team created lunchtime presentations, made signs and posters to hang throughout the campus, and shared recycling facts in morning announcements.
- Classroom presentations included a ‘test your knowledge’ activity worksheet about recycling and composting.
- Green Team students presented recycling and composting information at a staff meeting, and initiated a staff room recycling program.
Energy Conservation
- Comparing the first three months of 2008 to the first three months of 2010, the school’s energy bills dropped by approximately $5,000 due to increased energy conservation practices.
- All staff was asked to restrict the use of personal heaters, refrigerators and other appliances in offices and classrooms.
- Students focused on energy conservation for Earth Week awareness activities.
- Students regularly monitor classrooms for energy use practices and created a classroom energy conservation pledge to raise awareness and decrease energy use.
- Signs were posted on light switches to encourage staff and students to turn off lights in unoccupied spaces.
Environmental Education
- Environmental topics are integrated into the curriculum school-wide.
- Sixth grade students engage in a sustainability curriculum that explores the connection between energy use choices and natural resource depletion, and are asked to develop energy improvements strategies for the school.
- Seventh grade students explore world water issues in the context of sustainability and their personal water use footprints.
- Students use the school grounds as a learning tool. Seventh grade students study science through campus transect mapping activities and sixth grade students use the weather station at school to learn about climate and weather patterns.
Award
- The Cedar River Middle School Green Team received a King County Earth Hero at School award in April 2010.
For more information about this school’s conservation achievements and participation in the Green Schools Program, contact:
Treena Fritsch, teacher
E-mail: tfritsch@tahomaSD.US
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