Students Help School District Enact New Recycling Policy

From PUSD: Students of all ages helped conduct audits of a full day’s lunch waste at all 15 Pleasanton Unified School District (PUSD) schools, including the central office, during the first quarter of 2019. With training and guidance from the Go Green Initiative, a Pleasanton-based 501(c)3, PUSD students, teachers, principals, custodians and parent volunteers worked together to sort nearly 2,000 pounds of lunch waste into piles of trash, recycling and compost.

Each pile was bagged and weighed, and the volume in gallons was calculated. Each school used this data to determine how many blue recycling cans and green compost cans their school lunch area needed to hold the daily material and purchased the bins with a grant from the Altamont Education Advisory Board. By Earth Day, April 22, all PUSD school lunch areas will be in compliance with PUSD’s Integrated Waste Management Policy, adopted by the Board of Trustees in February 2018.

“For many years it has been a PUSD goal to educate global citizens. To commit fully to this we

must work together to address one of the most glaring global issues – dealing with waste,” said
Superintendent David Haglund, Ed.D. “This project has garnered support from every
stakeholder group in the district. We are incredibly proud of all the students who used their voice
to advocate and help implement our Integrated Waste Management policy, and grateful for our
District and school staff for their support in working with our students to make these
collaborative efforts a reality.”

This incredible feat was part of a District-wide environmental initiative inspired by a group of
Amador Valley High School students.

“The high school students who helped advocate for and enact this policy deserve a lot of respect,” says Jill Buck, founder & CEO, Go Green Initiative. “It took almost three years to bring this policy to fruition, and they were relentless in seeing this through.”

Last year, Amador students part of the Local Leaders of the 21st Century Club advocated for and the creation and implementation of a Integrated Waste Management Policy to assist the District in complying with new regulations and reducing the amount of waste produced in its schools. These students attended Board meetings to speak during public comment and collaborated with District staff to plan and implement the policy.

Of all the things I was involved with in high school, this project had the biggest impact on my life,” says Varsha Madapoosi, President, Amador Local Leaders of the 21st Century club. “I now understand what it takes to create good public policy and I hope to continue to pursue sustainability efforts in my future."

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