Waste Audit

For the waste audit students formed groups and gathered trashed from classrooms. Each group was given a bag of trash.


We then weighed the trash, it weighed about five pounds.


We then set up a tarp on the ground and dumped the trash on the tarp.


We then sorted the trash. We created different groups from the trash, this is the food group.


After sorting the trash we weighed the piles. About seventy percent of the trash was paper and plastic materials. The other thirty percent was food scraps.


Classrooms can reduce consumption and disposal of materials by using only the necessary amount and practicing the 4R's. Reduce can be applied to the trash we found by using less paper and not getting things that aren't going to be used. Reuse could be used by using the other side of printed paper for scratch paper or to print something else on it. Recycle can be applied by putting all the recyclable materials, like paper and plastic in the recycling bin. Rot can be used by making compost from all of the food scraps.

The class should focus on diverting paper in the classroom because most of the trash we found consisted of paper and it should have been recycled. In all of the classrooms only a certain amount of paper should be used. Also there should be recycling bins for paper.