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An Open Letter to the Pine Hill Community from the Sherborn Recycling Committee:
Some of you may have heard that in the fall our Committee will be spearheading an effort to collect food waste in the Pine Hill Lunchroom and will be encouraging waste-free lunches as much as possible. As the school year begins we will be working with the Student Council to help those student leaders learn about food composting and we will be relying on teachers as well to bring waste reduction issues into the classroom. On September 17 we have made plans for the “Composting Guru” at the Department of Environmental Protection to give a presentation at Pine Hill’s All-School Assembly to talk to everyone about composting. On approximately that date we will kick off our food waste collection program during lunch. Members of our Committee will be helping the Lunchroom Army of Parent Volunteers to supervise the children as they learn to scrape their food into barrels the Committee has purchased for the lunchroom and to recycle their plastic containers into different barrels for recycling. At first things could be messy and slow, but as we all get the hang of it (as with everything), we expect things will improve vastly.
The students at Chickering School in Dover have been doing this for the past year, once a month, and members of our Committee went to observe the operation last spring. We learned some tricks that we hope will make our efforts successful and we hope to make our every day program an example they may want to follow in the future.
As Pine Hill parents start to plan Back to School purchases, we hope you can try to buy lunch boxes and accessories that emphasize a waste-free mind set. There are numerous products on the market now, available in stores and online. The Container Store has some items, as does Whole Foods. Online, the below list will give you plenty of ideas and store locators will help you find local retailers. We hope you all will support this effort. We do this for the benefit of our planet (to refresh your memories go to http://recycling.sherbornma.org and click on Composting 101), but it is also benefits the Town’s bottom line. If we can reduce Pine Hill’s cost of disposing of waste by diverting it to less costly end points, then our taxes can be stretched a little farther.
As you shop for food to pack in those lunch boxes, please consider passing over single serve items. They are handy, yes, but the packaging is so wasteful! Once you have bought the proper little containers, you can put together your own single servings of anything your child could want. Much more economical too! And please don’t forget the evils of plastic bottles. They come in all sizes now, so fitting one into a lunch box should be easy.
We hope we can count on your support as we embark on this program. We are excited to be doing this and we are so happy that Veronica Kenney and her staff are enthusiastic in their support. If anyone wants to help out, please call Carol Rubenstein at 508-653-8794.
http://www.reuseit.com/store/lunch-c-248.html this is extensive.
http://www.nubiusorganics.com/Reusable-Containers--C263.aspx?s=Name ASC&p=ALL http://www.nubiusorganics.com/Reusable-Containers--C263.aspx?s=Name%20ASC&p=ALL%20
http://www.nubiusorganics.com/Reusable-Lunch-Bags-C55.aspx?s=Name ASC&p=2
http://www.ecobags.com/ToGoWare-Food-Carrier-SS;jsessionid=0a010c461f43c2134f2fed5e487fbac3e8696ee85bd4.e3eSc3qPbN0Te34Pa38Ta38Rchf0?sc=29&category=4352
http://www.ecobags.com/Recycled-Cotton-Canvas-Lunch-Bag
http://www.ecobags.com/To-Go-Ware-Conserve-Utensil-Set?sc=29&category=4352
http://www.ecobags.com/Brands/Built-NY-Products
http://www.ecobags.com/Brands/Rebel-Green
http://www.amazon.com/LunchBots-Uno-Stainless-Steel-Container/dp/B001OJ09NO/ref=pd_sim_dbs_k_27
http://www.amazon.com/Kids-Konserve-Stainless-Steel-Mini-Containers/dp/B0032UXTD0/ref=pd_sim_k_3 these look very small, and reviewers say the lids are hard to remove. One had a great idea: put a piece of ribbon across the top before putting on the lid, and then your child only has to pull up on the ribbon! They are also on the reuseit.com website above.
http://www.amazon.com/Kids-Konserve-Stainless-Steel-Containers-Leak-Proof/product-reviews/B0032UXTCG/ref=cm_rdphist_5?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=0&filterBy=addFiveStar these look like a better size, they are graduated. These are also on the reuseit.com website above.
Carol S. Rubenstein, Chair
Sherborn Recycling Committee
508-653-8794
We are on the Web!
http://recycling.sherbornma.org
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