Wednesday, May 7, 2008

Recycling awareness

I learned a lot about recycling and the amount of trash around our campus and how to prevent it. I learned that people, and even I, have been throwing away items like paper instead of recycling. Before I didn't think it was so important to recycle but I learned that all this trash ends up in landfills. I also learned that there are places like the Davis street transfer center that recycle the items people think as trash. In general I learned that recycling is important and everyone should get involved and start recycling.

At home I have only been doing two of the 4R's. I need to begin composting and reusing at home in order to complete the 4R's. I plan on using both sides of a paper to print stuff on and use the same water bottle multiple times so that I won't have to waste bottles. Also I could make sure to put yard trimmings in the green curbside bin which will be used for composting or make my own compost.

Everyone at Tennyson needs to start recycling and as many people they can about recycling . Many students don't care about recycling and throw away many things that could have been recycled. While there are some recycle bins in certain classrooms, there isn't enough. It's important to have plenty of recycling bins all around campus. Our leadership class has been educating students about recycling through presentations. The goal is to have a recycling bin for plastic bottles and paper in every classroom.

These are the bins that we need in the classrooms:


This is a bin inside a classroom and already there are some bottles:


For more information on recycling go to this website: http://www.stopwaste.org

Davis Street Transfer Center

On April 14 CMMA juniors went to the Davis Street Transfer Center for a field trip. The purpose of the facility is to collect items that normally would go to land fills and recycle them. It serves about 20 Bay Area cities. At the center bottles and plastic are recycled into new plastic materials. Wood is recycled into garden mulch used as a fertilizer for the ground and yard trimmings are made into compost. Also electronics are recycled at the facility.

These are the electronics being recycled:

These are cans and plastic bottles being recycled:

This is the mulch made from wood:


I learned that any material can be recycled at the center. Also you can make money by recycling these items that normally you throw away for free. I also learned recycling is vital to prevent a huge buildup of trash on our planet. I learned that we can reuse these recycled items for our own benefit. Instead of throwing away our old water bottles we can recycle them and then it will be turned into another bottle someone else can use.

The trash we place in the bins either gets burned or is placed in landfills. A landfill is a hole built into the ground in which trash is placed away from it's surroundings. It's basically a storage place for the trash. The landfill for Alameda is located at: 10840 Altamont Pass Road Livermore CA, 94550.

Thursday, May 1, 2008

Composting at THS Farm

Composting is a fertilizer made from leaves and twigs, grass clippings, succulent plant matter, old compost, and water. This rich fertilizer can be used to grow organic plants and is better for both the plants and the consumer because no pesticides are used. Compost contains nutrients that are essential for healthy plants and reduces the amount of water used to water the plants. To make a compost pile you have to water an area 4 feet long and 4 feet wide. Then lightly sprinkle old compost, add more water, and then add 2 inches of leaves and twigs. After that add more water, 5 inches of grass clippings, water, 5 inches of succulent plant matter and then repeat the steps until the pile is 4 feet tall.