Green Hands

What is Green Hands? Green Hands is a friendly recycling competition involving schools of the Ohio Valley.

What is the mission? The mission is to boost the recycling rate of local schools, provide fundamental environmental knowledge to students, and create a sustainable recycling program at each school to enable students to effectively practice recycling.

Each day, 56 million students and 4 million faculty, staff, and administrators (more than 20 percent of American residents) attend schools across the county. The cumulative impact of decisions made in schools has a large impact on the environment.

Why should your school participate? Green Hands will support your school with positive press, a sense of action, and introduce students to the valuable practice of recycling. Schools will be divided into categories, based on selected criteria, and the best performing schools will be awarded a trophy for their success. In this competition, everyone is a winner. The staff of the Schrader Environmental Center will also help your school apply for a grant to provide your facility with recycling bins for the fall semester of 2009.

What are the rules? 1. Pick the items that your school can recycle: Paper, plastic, or aluminum 2. Create collection bins 3. Set-up at least one centralized location to collect recyclables 4. Use the spring scale to measure the amount of recycling collected per week in pounds 5. Track and report results weekly to Patrick Wright.

When can we start? Green Hands will launch March 9, 2009 and conclude April 17, 2009. The six-week competition is designed to bring enthusiasm to your school’s program. Green Hands promotes recycling year round.

For more information, please contact Patrick Wright: pwright@oionline.com The Schrader Environmental Education Center 304.242.6855