John Barry Elementary School: Recycling & Gardening

Students: 18
Staff: 3
Mentor: Francisco Sobral
Project type: Waste Reduction
Location: Chicago, IL
Grade levels: K-6

Barry's project encouraged students to reuse and recycle in creative ways, including building bird feeders, toy marble rollercoasters, lava lamps and miniature cars using recyclable items, collected from around the neighborhood. They also created posters educating the entire school on how to organize waste and how long it takes trash to decompose. Barry also integrated waste reduction with maintaining their school garden, building catapults out of recycled materials, then making seed bombs and launching them into the garden with the catapults.

"We’re working together to develop ways to inform and enlighten all students at Barry about ways they can contribute to the reduction of waste and how we can improve the physical environment around our school and the neighborhood that surrounds it."

Linda M. Coologeorgen, Fourth and Fifth Grade Teacher