Marcy Elementary Green Team

A group of fifth graders had an idea at Marcy Elementary. They decided there was a lot of plastic in their lunches, but no option to recycle any of it. So, Annika Soposki, Norah Pezdek, Drew Vanderzell and Gaven Coriale came up with an idea. They created a petition that stated they wanted to make a change and give recycling as an option in the cafeteria. Their petition was successful, and they gathered many signatures from their classmates.

As Annika said, “We went to Miss Sutliff and asked if she wanted to support our idea and help form a Green Team. After that, the team was up and running!”

The group met during their lunchtimes and created a presentation to express why recycling was so important to them. They presented their ideas to Mr. Storsberg and Mr. Rothdiener. After this meeting, they continued to talk and create their slides to present to the students of Marcy Elementary. They also reached out to the Oneida-Herkimer Solid Waste Authority and gathered posters and recycling bins to start their plan.

Finally, they presented during each grade level lunchtime to teach the other students the new plan for recycling at Marcy Elementary. The new plan includes recycling plastic condiment containers, sporks, juice boxes, bottles and milk cartons. The group stated in the presentation, “If you have an idea, you can turn it into reality with hard work and determination.”

We can learn a lot from our fifth graders at Marcy Elementary!