Partnership with The Gaia Project

Category: School Recycling Support
Time frame: Since 2020
Location: New Brunswick
Status: Active

CCC has been sponsoring The Gaia Project’s delivery of its Trash Tracker program since 2020. This program is designed to inspire Grade 3-5 students in New Brunswick to create a waste diversion plan for their school. Each participating school is eligible for a small grant, to be used in the implementation of its plan.

As part of the partnership agreement, a new dedicated category for drink boxes and milk cartons was added to the Trash Tracker waste audit template for use in all participating schools. New communication materials focused on school-wide carton recycling strategies (e.g., setting up dump stations to handle the residual liquid from cartons) were also created and deployed in all participating schools.

According to the data collected from participating classrooms during the 2021-2022 school year, the largest divertible category to make up the waste stream was organic waste (30%), followed by paper and cardboard (each at 15%). Cartons, for their part, made up 12% of the waste stream.