Recycling Turned into a Rainbow Bench at Jefferson ECC

Jefferson Early Childhood Center in CUSD 200 is collecting 250 pounds of used plastic caps to recycle and make an 8ft. rainbow bench for their new playground area. They are working with Green Tree Plastics, a company located in southern Indiana.

Each classroom of students at Jefferson are sorting and weighing the caps. A picture of the recycling center in Ms. Cathy Maurer’s classroom is posted above. Two children work together and use a magnet to check for metal in the cap, check to make sure that the cap is smaller that 8 inches in diameter using the template on the table, and then check the digital scale to make sure that they have 1 pound. An adult supervises and the pound is then transferred to a shoe box. Once they have 10 boxes, students empty the shoe boxes to a larger tub, they mark the new total on their log chart, and start again. They have collected, sorted, and weighted over 55 pounds of caps since they began the project in January 2019.

In addition to the 250 pounds of caps the bench will cost $375. Students have raised this money via juice and applesauce pouch recycling efforts in collaboration with TerraCycle, which began in 2008. Jefferson Early Childhood Center receives $0.02 per pouch and they have raised over $660.00 since 2008.

The WWEA would like to thank the efforts of students and staff as they collaborate to build the bench for their new playground. Students are using life skills to calculate, log, and recycle for a planned goal. Excellent work, Jefferson!