CH-UH district steps up recycling efforts

Sam Bell and Harvetta Jordan directing traffic at the new bins. Photo by Glenn Oldenbrett.

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At the Heights High football season home opener on Sept. 13, volunteers were stationed near new recycling and trash bins, encouraging attendees to recycle and reduce the amount of litter around the field.

The initiative is one of two ideas promoted by the Sustainability Working Group (SWG), a group of sustainability-focused residents that was formed during the district’s school facilities planning process, which the Cleveland Heights-University Heights City School District is now implementing. In addition to a more comprehensive recycling program, the group also recommended that the district engage in a solid waste audit, a free service provided by the Cuyahoga County Solid Waste District.

According to Kristin Hughes, athletic director, the athletic department is partnering with SWG and the Heights High Environmental Club to educate fans and encourage recycling efforts at all games and contests. Dubbed the Tiger Nation Game Day Recycling Challenge, the initiative includes placing recycling bins throughout the new stadium and inside the lobby of the South Gym, stationing volunteers near the bins to help fans dispose of waste and recyclables appropriately, and public address announcements at all sporting events.

Hughes said that the initiative was a good first step. “We have never initiated a recycling program in the past at these events,” said Hughes. “So while I cannot give you a specific amount [that was recycled] I know it was more.”

Joan Spoerl, a member of SWG and one of the organizers of the effort, said that the idea to promote recycling at athletic events came about after the district decided to install artificial turf on the new field. “The field is made out of a non-renewable resource, but this recycling effort helps mitigate some of the negative effects of this,” she said. “The field will break down over a period of 10 years, and the plastic from the field will go into our watershed as it breaks down, and end up in Lake Erie. If we can educate our community and contribute less plastic pollution in the future, this would help mitigate the effects of the field.”

Spoerl said that she and other SWG members thought the results of the effort were mixed. “We feel like this is a good beginning,” she said, “but we still have lots to do.”

Laura Marks, also an SWG member, agreed. “We collected a lot of trash and recyclable material from spectators that otherwise would have been strewn on the ground,” she said. “We diverted a lot of recyclable material from the landfill. We also reduced the amount of time and effort grounds crew and custodians needed to spend cleaning up afterward. Most importantly, we made recycling and proper trash disposal visible.”

But, she sees the importance of changing the culture in the district. “Heights High is an educational facility; we need to teach responsible behavior, such as cleaning up after yourself.”

The district has four more home games during its regular season—Sept. 27, Oct. 4, Oct. 25 and Oct. 30—and plans to have volunteers stationed at those games. Similar initiatives are planned for other district sporting events.

SWG has urged the school district to increase awareness of recycling as part of its current activities in order to design for sustainability as the school buildings are remodeled and rebuilt as part of the districtwide facilities process. “Attitudes must change from kindergarten up, and from the superintendent down,” stated SWG’s report to the CH-UH Board of Education.

Kathleen Rocco, an education specialist with the Cuyahoga County Solid Waste District, met in September with CH-UH district staff and SWG members to discuss implementation of a solid waste audit for all of the district’s buildings, beginning with the elementary schools.

The waste audit will involve the collecting, sorting and weighing of a representative sample of each school building’s trash. On the date of the trash sort, custodians will collect one-day’s worth of trash from the cafeteria and classrooms. Volunteers will open a sample of the bags and sort the trash into several categories: paper cartons (milk cartons and juice boxes), cardboard, mixed paper, metals and cans, plastics, glass, food waste, food-waste packaging, and other. The piles of waste of each type will then be weighed, and all of the bags of trash will be weighed.

The data will show how much waste is created by each school, and how much of it can be recycled. Once the district has a benchmark for each building, its staff can work with members of SWG, PTAs and other community groups to devise programs and communication strategies to encourage more recycling and less waste generation. As part of the process, the district will conduct a follow-up audit after programs and strategies are put in place, with the hope that it will show progress toward the goal of reducing waste.

The district is looking for volunteers from the community to help with the waste audit and Game Day Recycling Challenge. The waste audit takes place from 2:30-5:30 p.m. in the gymnasium of all elementary schools on the following dates: Oct. 2 (Boulevard); Oct. 28 (Gearity Professional Development School); Oct. 29 (Noble); Oct. 30 (Oxford); Nov. 18 (Canterbury); Nov. 20 (Roxboro); Nov. 21 (Fairfax). To volunteer for either initiative, contact Angee Shaker in the district’s communications office at a_shaker@chuh.org or 216-371-7131.

“I am grateful for every small and large change-for-the-better the district has incorporated into operations and the building design,” said Marks. “I have hopes we can do more because the Cleveland Heights and University Heights residents are amazing.”