Schools aim to boost recycling efforts

To promote Earth Week and recycling in general, Flathead and Glacier high schools are holding a Crosstown Recycling Challenge today through May 6.

The goal is to boost the collections of recyclable material at the large recycling containers on school campuses.

At Flathead, the large blue recycling bin is located near the corner of Sixth Street and Sixth Avenue West. At Glacier, the bin is in the southeast corner of the parking lot.

Community members living near the schools are encouraged to bring all their household recyclables to the bins during the challenge — but the bins will be open to community recycling even after the challenge wraps up.

Mary Critchlow, facilitator of Glacier’s Recycling Club, said the challenge is intended to help boost the amount of recyclable materials the schools take in. They need 24 percent more recyclables to keep the bins open, she said.

“If they don’t fill quickly enough, it’s too expensive for the agencies” that allow the schools to host the bins, Critchlow explained. She estimated that between Flathead and Glacier high schools and a bin at Kalispell Middle School, located in the lower parking lot, the bins fill about every two weeks.

One of the biggest obstacles has been recyclers who don’t flatten their cardboard boxes before throwing them in the bin, Critchlow added.

“The bin fills really quickly and [the bin for] plastic and paper doesn’t fill up,” she said, adding that those who take the items to be recycled collect little money for the cardboard.

In addition to cardboard, the bins at the schools collect all types of paper, including magazines, phone books and coverless hard-cover books; No. 1 and No. 2 plastics; aluminum; and tin, Critchlow said.

The district’s bins don’t collect glass, but there are options for those who want to recycle glass, she said. Target, New World Recycling and The Green Machine offer glass recycling.