South Carolina
green step schools

Tamassee-Salem ES Green Team students learned about composting from Christina Passafaro from Oconee County Solid Waste and Recycling. She and Maureen Whitman brought bins to use for composting. Grades 3-5 are currently composting food waste every day at lunch. 5th grade students are responsible for dumping the compost in the outside bin. The Green Team created slide shows and graphics to broadcast to the rest of the students and lunchroom staff about composting. They also taught other classmates what can and cannot be composted. The goal is to increase composting efforts school-wide next year, and they will be using the compost in their pollinator garden. 

Blue Ridge ES 3^rd grade students show us how to learn, do and teach others about garden composting in this fun video. 

Windsor ES vermicompost project. 

Windsor ES Vermicompost.mp4

Irmo students LOVED getting the wonderful hands-on training from John Oxner to build two rain barrels for use in the Irmo Gardens.   

Students at White Knoll High School document the learning, doing, and teaching requirements for their six current Green Step projects with pictures on their school website. Great job!

Ebenezer MS students learned about the dangers of litter from mentor, Katie Altman. Next FBLA, National Junior Honor Society and other Ebenezer MS students collected litter near their school. Finally, the students taught others about their project by displaying a poster showing what they collected.

White Knoll HS Environmental Science students set up a classroom vermicompost bin under the direction of Green Steps mentor Jane Hiller. They learned to poke air holes in the lid of a used Styrofoam cooler. They then prepared damp newspaper bedding and buried some coffee grounds and an apple core before adding 16 red wiggler worms to the bin. They will manage the bin, watch the bedding transform into compost and then count their increased worm population in the spring.  

Students at Columbia Islamic School learned about composting and vermicomposting during classroom programming with the Richland Soil and Water Conservation District (RSWCD). They set up an outdoor composting bin, donated by Richland County, and an indoor vermicomposting bin, provided by the RSWCD. 

   . 

Members of the 12 student Recycling Team at Center for Knowledge learned to weave plastic bag mats on pizza box looms.

Grant money will help James B. Edwards Elementary continue and expand Green Step projects.