Flower Hill Recycling Campaign
Pays Off
Erika Sabogal third grade class is sold on recycling. The Flower Hill teacher's students have recycled enough soda and water bottles to replant numerous trees in a section of the Central and South American rainforest.
In an effort to surpass last year's goal of planting 20,000 square feet of trees, Ms. Sabogal's current class raised $194 and was able to plant 48,829 square feet of trees through the Arbor Day Foundation. "That's a total of 3,880 bottles," the teacher exclaimed.
The fundraising was performed solely in Ms. Sabogal's class, beginning on the very first day of school and running through mid-April. "We had such a great collaborative atmosphere among the students last year that I wanted to see if the boys and girls would rise to the challenge and beat last year's amount of $74," the teacher said. The 2012/13 class did just that, bringing in bottles by the bagful.
It was students such as Jesus Acevedo, who brought in kitchen bags stuffed with bottles on a bi-weekly basis that made the campaign so successful. Seeing Mr. Acevedo's efforts, the rest of the class was inspired to do what they considered to be their share.
"The students made a connection with our recycling initiative to the effort in the Treasures reading series, Here's My Dollar, where a nine-year old girl is able to save her local zoo by raising money one dollar at a time," Ms. Sabogal said.
The fundraising effort has also tied nicely into the school's rainforest theme for Flower Hill's Curriculum Night, which is scheduled for May 15. Students studied the life cycle of various rainforest birds, identified where they migrated on a map, wrote reports, illustrated the life cycle and birds and even created a mural depicting the rainforest. Students also counted incoming monies on a bi-weekly basis and figured out how many bottles were recycled by utilizing division.
"I am extremely proud of my students and see the pride and joy in their faces each time we were able to color in more of the goal barometer," Ms. Sabogal said. "I never knew we could almost triple last year's efforts."
The teacher hopes to continue the ongoing campaign next year, "where hopefully even more trees can be planted in honor of Arbor Day by a group of students from Huntington," she said.
To learn more about planting trees visit www.arborday.org.