Kid Log Company is a student-based recycling company at Willow Elementary School in Willow, Alaska. The Kid Log Company began by recycling newspapers into fireplace logs and selling them to the local community. In one year, the company recycled 3,500 newspapers. In 1992, the company received the President’s Environmental Youth Award from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The students learn about business in the process, keeping track of their own bookkeeping and developing new business ideas. The company’s profits go toward environmental education materials for the school.
In the company’s third year, a new business activity – creating note pads from used copy paper – was initiated. This year, a new practice has begun to recycle the sand spread on the school’s sidewalks and playground for use each winter.
In the past year, the company has recycled 800 pounds of newspapers and 3,400 pounds of aluminum cans collected by the community of Willow. The company has raised about $1000 during the past year through log sales and aluminum collection. Many of the logs the company produces are donated to senior citizens and people in the community who cannot afford wood to heat their homes.
Kid Log also initiated other activities to meet the Green Star standards. The students invited an electric company representative to come to the school and educate everyone in the concepts of meter reading and off-peak energy usage. Students are responsible for turning off lights and lowering shades at night to reduce heat loss in winter in their own classroom. They also posted signs throughout the school to remind everyone to conserve energy.
The company also recycles organic wastes from the class’ lunches in a worm-composting bin in the classroom. The large steel cans from the school cafeteria are recycled into dog dishes for local dog mushers. Used wallpaper samples are used as placemats for community senior luncheons.
Kid Log Company is proud to be in its 11th year of continuous business. It continues with the emphasis of teaching students that by doing their little part, they can keep our environment healthy for the future. For the past three years, Kid Log Company has sponsored an overnight trip to the Seward Sealife Center for company members so they may have a better understanding of what they are helping to preserve and an appreciation for their environment. The trip has also included other learning experiences involving the environment such as fish hatchery tours and stops at Big Game Alaska to see many of the animals with which Alaskans share their world. It has even been possible to include citizens from the Willow community, with no school age children, as participants on this trip. The Willow community has taken an important ownership in Kid Log Company through the years and students are very proud and eager in their quest to learn more about the environment in which they live. Kid Log Company thanks Green Star for its help and encouragement.
