Sustainability Programs in Education
Get inspired for big changes to a greener future with these sustainable success stories.
Are you passionate about creating a sustainable future but not sure where to start? Look no further! Your school administrators, students, and parents are ready to support you in this journey towards environmental conservation. With an abundance of resources available, including those shared by food service directors in the Southern California CSNA chapter, beginning sustainability projects have never been easier.
Read on to learn how together, we can make a positive impact and pave the way for a brighter, greener tomorrow. Let’s seize this opportunity to stimulate change and make sustainability programs seamlessly merge with current programs. Remember, even the smallest of actions is necessary for big changes.
Reducing Food Waste
Before creating a sustainability program, be sure to map out your goals for the program to establish expectations. Think about why you need a sustainability program, and what you hope to accomplish with it.
Unappealing, unappetizing, or non-engaging food can decrease meal participation and increase food waste. And it’s true – when more food gets eaten up, there’s less getting thrown away. It’s as easy as that! Identify problems in your school program by narrowing down which menu items, preferences, or types of food your student body is interested in through Food Waste Audits.
Tackling food waste begins with understanding the problem. Using Student Food Waste Audits directly includes student input on current menu items. First, create multiple “buckets” or containers for students to fill with their unwanted food and label it. Making sure that students understand the types of the food they are eating provides them with the means to understand their preferences, and the deficiencies in your program. Educators can be stationed by the food sorting containers to ask students directly about their reasons for discarding food. Food sorting containers can then be measured and analyzed after meal time.
Share tables There are loads of other examples of successful food waste prevention, too.
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Starting a Recycling Program
Recycling programs have come a long way as more people gain awareness and support for the cause. And these changes would’ve never been possible without early education of environmental impact, sustainability, and the importance of conservation. Start your recycling program with a fun interactive activity that is at the core of recycling – create a storage bin from fully recycled materials, like plastics, old containers, and keep products away from the land fill. Then, create the path to recycling with a complete recycling program resource.
Without taking time to create new programs from scratch, many programs and educational materials have been compiled as the shift towards sustainability began. One of the larger programs is by Pepsico, by the name of Recycle Rally.
Recycle Rally is a free recycling program for K12 schools in the U.S. with student education, inspiration, and free resources to reach recycling goals. Although Recycle Rally does not directly collect materials from schools, it provides inspiration, incentives, and tools for schools to succeed. Join the rally today here, with Pepsi Co. Recycle Rally offers students and teachers incentives, promotes healthy recycling competition, and translates impact to easy to understand terms. Furthermore, if you are unable to recycle at your school, Pepsico Recycling includes solution here.
Food waste from food and plastic pollution as a by-product of food consumption builds up over time, causing large sweeping impacts on our earth. Working to prevent that through food waste prevention programs and recycling programs are small steps that eventually make large changes. Get started this summer!
