The third graders noticed that our cafeteria sells hundreds of tiny plastic water bottles at lunch, and none of them get recycled in the cafeteria. Our third graders will study weather and climate standards to learn more about the weather hazard of drought. They will learn about various drought conditions around the world. Then we will learn ways we can conserve water in our own drought-ridden state.
Our third graders studied weather and climate standards to learn more about the weather hazard of drought. They learned about various drought conditions around the world. Then we learned ways we can conserve water in our own drought-ridden state. The third graders noticed that our cafeteria sells hundreds of tiny plastic water bottles at lunch, and none of them get recycled in the cafeteria. The approach we took was to take data on how many water bottles are sold each day. We used the data to create an awareness campaign for the other students to teach them about how much water is used to make and recycle those little bottles. We sold STEM Launch reusable water bottles and encouraged students to use those instead of getting the small bottles with their lunch. We used the grant money to purchase two large recycling receptacles for the cafeteria. We will use the remaining funds to go toward purchasing a water bottle filler fountain.The district sent out a plumber for the estimate and we are just waiting for the word from the district to move forward with purchasing and installation. All students in the building became aware of the issue. They started recycling the bottles in the new containers. National Junior Honor Society members dumped the recycle bins into the large bin each week. We had water and sustainability experts come to the school to hear the students' solutions. For example, sustainability experts from LarkBurger came and people from Thornton Water. One of the consultants was so impressed that she worked with her company to raise additional funds for us to receive our water bottle fountain.
