ACC Students Mine Opportunity Through Recycling

Jimmy, a student at the Anne Carlsen Center, grabs a bag of shredded paper to be recycled at Renaissance Recycling. Jimmy and other students at the ACC Campus are once again able to do their part to help save the planet’s resources.

The air is cold and the snow waist high, but Jimmy Brown doesn’t mind. He has a task to complete.

Jimmy is, in his own small way, helping save the world. He and his classmates at the Anne Carlsen Center are recycling again after a forced hiatus.

Reducing the Footprint

After closing its doors at the beginning of 2009, Jamestown’s recycling center reopened in March.

Many residents had frequently used the recycling center and didn’t want to see Jamestown without that option. One of those individuals is Tom Kenna, one of Jimmy's teachers at the Center.

“It is a big relief to have the recycling center open again,” said Kenna. “Its closing didn’t just affect us; it was affecting everyone at the Center.”

The benefits of the Center’s recycling efforts are endless. Recycling is an important learning activity for all of the students at the Center. It begins in the classrooms, as students learn how products – such as plastics – will not break down when thrown away.

Next comes the hands-on experience. Students collect recyclable items, sort them into appropriate categories, bag them, and eventually transport them away to be recycled.

A few weeks after the recycling center’s closing, students wrote letters to city leaders, encouraging them to continue supporting the recycling program. The city’s mayor, Clarice Liechty, wrote a letter back to the students, expressing her confidence about the continuance of the program.

Renaissance Recycling opened its doors in March 2009, and recycling traffic that had once flown through the Center began running again. Students from Tom Kenna’s classroom loaded pickup beds full of cans, paper and plastics.

A Re-energized Cycle

Students are excited to be recycling again. They grab a bag – be it filled with shredded paper, plastics or cans – and load it into pickup beds. It is 10: 30 a.m. and this is the second time today they’ve loaded the beds of two pickups, and there are still enough bags for at least one more trip.

In the few months Jamestown was without a recycling facility, Kenna’s class accumulated 103 bags of shredded paper, 12 boxes of newspapers, two boxes of magazines, and 2,237 pounds of cardboard.

On this particular trip to Renaissance Recycling, it is Jimmy who will help Kenna and Cody Lausch, a Center Life Skills Assistant. Wearing his jacket, gloves and hat, the teen is a ball of energy in the pickup seat as the load is transported toward its second life. His radiant smile is a testament to the excitement he is feeling.

Jimmy knows how important recycling is to the continued well-being of Earth. He has been a recycling advocate while attending the Center. He’s submitted articles on recycling for the employee newsletters and the student newspaper and now is once again doing his part to reduce his own carbon footprint.

At the recycling center Jimmy starts to work. He unloads garbage bag after garbage bag of shredded paper into large cardboard boxes. First he tears a hole in the bag before shaking the contents into a large, neat pile. Then the plastic bag goes into a box, and it is on to the next bag.

The young man smiles as he completes each bag and heads to the pickup for another. There is a sense of accomplishment, a sense he is doing the right thing. It is a job well done – and he knows it.

After both pickups are unloaded, Jimmy meets Mark Gray, one of the new owners of Renaissance Recycling. Gray is interested in having Jimmy and other students at the Center help on a regular basis.

Jimmy introduces himself and shakes Gray’s hand. A bond is forged, and a new friend is made.

“That is the real benefit there,” says Kenna, later in the day when all the bags have been transported. “That is another contact in the community for the students.”

“I think this could be a tremendous partnership,” says Gray. “For the kids and for the public.”

Learning Outside the Classroom

For students at the Center, helping out at Renaissance Recycling offers a well of experience to draw from.

Along with the sorting skills they will learn and develop, students will get a chance to interact with community members as they bring in their own recyclables. These community members will get the opportunity to see an individual learning and thriving.

“There are so many good things that can come out of this opportunity, you sit back and say wow,” said Kenna. “If Jimmy or another student can go there and help those guys, they will learn so many things. Customer service, social skills, working together in a group, sorting. But that social aspect, that is a big one.”

The training and experiences learned can serve many of the students for years to come.

“This opportunity could be a big help with our adult services,” said Kenna. “We will be able to prepare our students for a paying job, hopefully. That will help create the least-restrictive living arrangement possible for them.”

This is one of the many ways the Anne Carlsen Center is nurturing abilities and changing lives. The Center puts the power in the hands of students, helping them to create a life they are proud of … today and beyond.