![[logo] US EPA](http://www.epa.gov/epafiles/images/logo_epaseal.gif){kind=logo}
Resources to Reduce Waste in Schools
You will need the free Adobe Reader to view some of the files on this page. See EPA’s PDF page to learn more.
The following Web sites and publications for administrators, teachers, and students provide information on waste reduction; present ideas for classroom, after-school, and extra-credit activities; and provide lesson plans and school projects.
EPA Websites
EPA Publications
Other Websites
Other Publications
EPA Websites
Municipal Solid Waste
Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle
Learn how to reduce, reuse, and recycle materials around your school, home, and community.
Recycling
This site explores why we need to consider a combination of solutions to manage recycling. Reducing and reusing waste, recycling, burning trash for energy recovery, and landfilling are all parts of the solution.
Common Wastes and Materials
This section of EPA’s website contains information on recycling activities associated with a variety of materials recovered for recycling in the United States.
Planet Protectors Club
Elementary school students can make a difference by reducing the amount of waste they throw away. The Planet Protectors Club will teach kids how to recycle and reuse materials at school and at home. Additional games and activities teach more about reducing waste and conserving resources.
Make a Difference Campaign for Middle School Students
EPA’s “Make a Difference” campaign is aimed at educating and engaging middle school students in resource conservation and environmental protection. This campaign helps students make informed decisions about protecting the environment in their day-to-day lives. The resources offered in this campaign will inspire students to reduce, reuse, and recycle waste—to“make a difference” at home, at school, and in the community. This website also includes information on holding a “Make a Difference Day.”
Your Environment. Your Choice.
This EPA website encourages high school students to make environmentally sound choices about the products and natural resources they use, the waste they create and the environment in which they live.
Teacher Resources
The resources on this website provide information to assist in teaching students about the waste generated in our schools, homes, and communities, and what can be done to make a difference! From classroom activities to starting a school electronics recycling program, these materials will help explain how to reduce and better manage waste. Many of these resources are provided in both English and Spanish.
Composting
Composting
This website discusses what composting is, what compost can be used for, how compost reduces waste, and other related topics.
Food Waste
This website provides information about environmentally sound food waste management, including how to recover and reduce surplus food and food waste.
Partnership Programs
WasteWise
WasteWise is a free EPA program through which organizations—including schools—eliminate costly municipal solid waste and select industrial wastes, benefiting their bottom line and the environment. WasteWise is a flexible program, allowing partners to design their own waste reduction programs tailored to their needs and offering partners free technical assistance and recognition opportunities.
Plug-In To eCycling
Plug-In To eCycling aims to increase the safe recycling of old consumer electronics by: providing the public with information about electronics recycling and increasing opportunities to safely recycle old electronics; facilitating partnerships with communities, electronics manufacturers, and retailers to promote shared responsibility for safe electronics recycling; and establishing pilot projects to test innovative approaches to safe electronics recycling.
Schools Chemical Clean Out Campaign (SC3)
SC3 seeks to create a chemically safer school environment by not only cleaning out excess, legacy, unused, and improperly stored chemicals, but also going a step further and implementing preventive mechanisms in schools.
Buy Recycled
Buy Recycled
Buying recycled helps “close the recycling loop” by putting the materials collected through recycling programs back to good use as products in the marketplace. This website includes resources and databases to help identify recycled content products.
Electronics Recycling
eCycling
This website provides a wealth of information for consumers on issues related to e-waste, including electronics waste reduction through reuse, donation, recycling, and purchasing green electronic equipment.
Climate Change
Climate Change and Waste
This website introduces and explains the connection between solid waste reduction and global climate change. Additionally, there is a link to the WAste Reduction Model (WARM), a free tool that calculates and totals greenhouse gas emissions of baseline and alternative waste management practices—source reduction, recycling, combustion, composting, and landfilling. iWARM is the consumer version of WARM – it helps you understand the energy saved by recycling small quantities of common household products, rather than landfilling them.
Funding
Environmental Education Grants
The Grants Program sponsored by EPA’s Office of Environmental Education supports environmental education projects that enhance the public’s awareness, knowledge, and skills to help people make informed decisions that affect environmental quality.
Environmental Policies and Contracts
Environmentally Preferable Purchasing (EPP)
EPP is a federal-wide program that encourages and assists Executive agencies in the purchasing of environmentally preferable products and services.
Resource Management (RM)
RM contracting is a strategic alternative to traditional hauling and disposal contracts, providing a financial incentive for waste reduction innovations. WasteWise offers an extensive how-to manual to help organizations gain a firm grasp of the concept of RM and negotiate their waste hauling contracts to focus on resource conservation.
EPA Publications
The EPA publications below can be ordered from the appropriate website listed below or online.
Municipal Solid Waste
The Make a Difference Kit: Your Life, Your World, Your Choices
A resource package of materials to encourage teens in grades 6 through 8 to make informed decisions in their everyday lives. The kit includes the following resources, plus many more:
The Life Cycle of a CD or DVD (PDF) (2 pp, 400K)
A colorful poster showing the product life cycle of a CD or DVD from production through recycling, reuse, and disposal. Includes classroom and after school activities.Science Fair Fun: Designing Environmental Science Projects (PDF) (16 pp, 263K)
A short booklet intended to provide students in grades 6 through 8 with ideas and resources for developing environmental science fair projects, specifically in the areas of reducing, reusing, and recycling waste materials.Pack a Waste-Free Lunch
Learn how to reduce, reuse, and recycle items in school lunches and how to organize a Waste-Free Lunch Day at your school.
The Quest for Less
The Quest for Less provides hands-on lessons and activities, enrichment ideas, journal writing assignments, and other educational tools and skills related to reusing, reducing, and recycling waste for students in grades K through 8.
Measurement
WasteWise Update: The Measure of Success (PDF) (18 pp, 1.6MB)
This WasteWise Update document describes how to measure waste reduction, including selecting the right measurement approach, establishing a baseline, collecting data, and calculating results. It also details how to assess cost savings, environmental impacts, and hidden benefits of waste reduction.
Other Websites
The following materials provide additional waste reduction ideas, including school waste reduction manuals. Publications can be ordered from the appropriate website listed below and are free, unless otherwise specified. Please note, links to a non-EPA website do not constitute an endorsement by EPA.
Municipal Solid Waste
Educational Resources for Waste Management, Cornell Waste Management Institute 
A catalog of educational materials on the following topics: composting, recycling, waste management, enviroshopping, waste prevention, and sewage sludge. Many of the resources are suitable or schools (grades K-12).
Composting
Composting in Schools
The Cornell Composting Web site teaches students and teachers about using composting in the classroom. Don't miss the section on “weird and unusual composting.”
School Waste Reduction Programs
California Department of Resources Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle) School Waste Reduction
CIWMB’s website for school waste reduction is designed for school administrators (especially district-level administrators) and provides pointers for waste assessments and audits in schools and extensive, practical suggestions for waste reduction by functional area: facilities and planning, food service, maintenance and operations, purchasing, and technology services. Learn more about programs in other states or Information about programs in other states or view a listing of potential funding sources .
King County, Washington, Green Schools Program
This program helps schools start or improve their recycling programs; increase waste reduction activities; and increase their use of recycled content and other environmentally preferable products. Includes sample waste assessment and tracking forms.
Massachusetts Department of Environmental Protection Recycling Assistance for Schools
This website provides recycling information for students and teachers, including A Manual for Implementing School Recycling Programs (Word) (54 pp, 287K) , providing step-by-step instructions for starting, building, and maintaining school recycling programs.
Oregon Green Schools
The Oregon Green Schools initiative provides resources to help Oregon schools set up and maintain effective, permanent waste reduction and resource efficiency programs that improve school environments and communities.
Getting a Recycling Program Started in Your School
The University of Arkansas’ Division of Agriculture Cooperative Extension Service offers this step-by-step guide to setting up recycling programs in schools.
American Forest & Paper Association (AF&PA) School Recycling
The AF&PA school recycling Web site offers educational flyers, posters, and a recycling video for downloading to help students see the difference they can make by increasing the amount of paper they recycle.
Funding
FundingFactory
FundingFactory is a free fundraising program to help educational and nonprofit organizations get the equipment or cash they need. Schools collect empty printer cartridges and used cell phones for points, and then redeem the points for new equipment or cash.
Paper Retriever® Community Recycling Program
Simply collect mixed paper and newspapers in the Paper Retrievers to earn money.
Environmental Policies and Contracts
District Administration Resources
Sample environmental policies are available online from the California Department of Resource Recycling and Recovery (CalRecycle).
Measurement
WasteWise Volume-to-Weight Conversion Factors (PDF) (21 pp, 236K)
Organized by material, this comprehensive list of volume-to-weight conversion factors for commonly collected materials will help accurately quantify waste reduction activities.
Other Publications
School Waste Reduction Programs
Recycling Manual for New Jersey Schools (PDF) (58 pp, 120K) , Association of New Jersey Recyclers, 1999.
This manual guides key school personnel step-by-step through the process of setting up a recycling program. It provides all the necessary tools for designing and implementing a viable and comprehensive program in schools.
Catch the Cycle: A Guide to Recycling in Georgia Schools , Keep Georgia Beautiful, undated.
Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle are the key components to a comprehensive school waste reduction program. This guide from Keep Georgia Beautiful, focuses on recycling, but does not discount the importance of reduction and reuse.
Beyond Recycling: A Waste Reduction Manual for Schools , Environmental Resource Program, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and Office of Waste Reduction, North Carolina Department of Environment, Health, and Natural Resources, undated.
A comprehensive manual on school waste prevention and recycling, this document covers program management, waste assessments, logistics, waste reduction strategies, program maintenance, and case studies (all drawn from North Carolina). It provides guidance to school administrators, teachers, staff, students, and parents. Several worksheets and checklists aid program implementation.
Composting
School Composting: A Manual for Connecticut Schools (PDF) (98 pp, 3.4MB) , Connecticut Department of Environmental Protection, 2002.
This document explains how to establish and maintain a successful school-wide composting program for cafeteria food scraps.
A Guide to Composting in Schools (PDF) (28 pp, 477K) >, Iowa Department of Natural Resources (DNR), undated.
This guide provides a general introduction to how and why schools should develop a composting program. The guide begins by discussing the purpose of a waste audit and reviewing different composting options, such as bin composting and vermicomposting, and includes a discussion of budgeting issues that should be considered as part of this evaluation. Implementation topics associated with separating and composting identified organic wastes are covered in a high level summary, followed up with technical appendices that provide forms, technical fact sheets, sources of additional information, and a recent school composting case study.
Vermicomposting
The Worm Guide: A Vermicomposting Guide for Teachers (PDF) (48 pp, 1.5MB) , California Integrated Waste Management Board (CIWMB), revised 2004.
CIWMB’s guide explores vermicomposting, which in a school setting can set the stage for a variety of fun, interdisciplinary activities.
