Zero Waste Lunchroom Initiative coming to the Beach Haven School

The Beach Haven School students and staff are committing to creating a more environmentally friendly school environment through a Zero Waste Lunchroom Initiative, which includes the setup of an on-site compost. The free-standing compost tumbler is being donated to the school and should be ready for use in the springtime, when the weather is more conducive for setting up the project, Sunday D’Arcangelo, who teaches the school’s special education, Spanish/ ESL and basic skills classes, told the public during the board of education’s first regular meeting of the year, held Thursday, Feb. 5.

Many of the students are ditching
plastic water bottles, which are
harmful to the local environment.

Although D’Arcangelo said the initiative is one she has wanted to establish in all the schools she has worked in, she acknowledged that it is “very hard to do” in a big school such as in the Stafford Township School District. Thus, the Beach Haven School’s small student body, about 180 students, offers a great opportunity “to make our lunchroom as close to zero waste as possible,” she said.

The school also does not provide hot lunches, nor is it bound to any food service agreements that require the use of Styrofoam trays or other non-recyclable products in the cafeteria, D’Arcangelo added.

“We already have a lot in our favor,” she said.

Many of the students already participate in environmentally friendly lunch habits such as using reusable containers and silverware.

“If every child for the length of the time that they’re here – from pre-K through sixth-grade – did use a plastic fork 180 days out of the school year, for all those years 1,260 plastic forks would be used,” D’Arcangelo emphasized.

However, most of the children are in favor of switching from plastic to eco-friendly water bottles, she said.

“Instead of 180 plastic water bottles, one for each day of the school year, which would equal about $220 by the way, they could have none,” she noted.

Plastic does not biodegrade and continues to leach toxins into the waterways and soil, and is then consumed by animals. Small, individual snack wrappers are the third-most common piece of litter found on beaches, after plastic bags and cigarette butts, D’Arcangelo said.

Aside from encouraging parents to prepare their children’s lunches with environmentally responsible packaging to help combat the amount of litter that ends up on the beaches, D’Arcangelo also asked parents to donate old pots with secure lids, which would be placed in each of the classrooms so students can properly dispose of their snack residue. Apple cores and even paper can be composted, she mentioned.

— Kelley Anne Essinger


This article was published in The SandPaper.