Haine Middle School Students Take Recycling to the Next Level

Haine Middle School students are recycling champions.

After months of participating in a recycling competition, students in Susan Huber and Jeremiah Friday’s homerooms recently learned they have won the school contest—and will be rewarded with a surprise field trip.  

The contest was inspired by Haine’s participation in Keep America Beautiful’s “Recycle Bowl” competition, which the school entered last fall.

At the time, students were hoping to learn about the value of recycling, and perhaps finish among the top schools in the state for the event.

They had no idea what a big deal recycling would become just six months later.

As part of the “Recycle Bowl” competition, the fifth and sixth grade students created a recycling program and collected paper, plastic and aluminum from every room in the building. They weighed and recorded how much they were able to collect and recycle.

By the end of the month-long competition, Haine had collected more than 3,000 pounds of material. With that impressive total, Haine finished in seventh place out of 27 Pennsylvania schools.

Of the 1,500 schools involved in the competition nationwide, 4.5 million pounds of material were collected and recycled.

The school has been recycling for a few years now, but when they saw the local and national results of the “Recycle Bowl,” Haine principal Steven Smith and fifth grader teacher Allison Stebbins decided to challenge their students with a contest of their own.

“The kids put forth a big effort in the fall,” Mrs. Stebbins says. “But they took it to a different level during Haine’s competition.”

Every two weeks from Jan. 11 to April 18, students in Haine’s classrooms weighed recycled material they collected. The fifth and sixth grade classrooms with the most recycled items received the coveted “Golden Trashcan”

After the first two weeks, the kids were hooked.

“These students are so creative,” Stebbins said. “They started making iMovie commercials. They created more than 15 iMovies to educate and inspire the building to recycle. That’s made a huge difference in our efforts.”

The students only weighed the amount they collected from their respective classrooms. In the fall, they had weighed everything collected from all over the school for one total weight.

Stebbins estimated that the students more than doubled their efforts from the fall.

The classrooms alone recycled a combined weight of more than 6,000 pounds. There were even days that students and teachers couldn’t shut the lids on the recycling bins outside the school.

At the end of the contest, the classrooms that won the golden can the most times was awarded a class field trip to a yet undecided destination.

Stebbins said the two winning homerooms recycled nearly 1,000 pounds combined in just two months.

Earth Day was perfect day to announce the winning homerooms, she said. She added the students had learned even more than just the value of recycling and its benefits to the environment.

“Because these were both competitions, we had to collect and keep accurate data,” Stebbins said. “So we’re teaching the kids math, statistics and environmental science. Then you look at what they created for the TV announcements, and it’s clear they’re learning a lot about marketing, communications and writing.”

In fact, Stebbins said Haine is planning to use the recycling competition as a template for other big initiatives within Haine Middle and Elementary schools.

The students have big plans for next fall’s national “Recycle Bowl” competition. They hope to finish number one in the state, and possibly number one in the nation.

-- Article and photos submitted by Seneca Valley School District. Have news you'd like to share with Patch readers? Email Editor Jessica Sinichak at jessica.sinichak@patch.com or become a blogger in our "Local Voices" section. 

 Like Us on Facebook | Follow Us on Twitter

Check out some of today's other top stories here.