The Issue:
-During the school year, each student will create 240 pounds of waste.
-The average family with school age children will spend $594.24 on back-to-school purchases this year!
-During the school year, the average school throws away 38 tons of paper, the equivalent of 644 trees!
-Each year, six billion pens are thrown away in the U.S.!
-During the school year, each elementary school cafeteria creates 18,760 pounds of waste.
-Schools use more than $6 billion in energy every year and about $1.5 billion (or enough to hire about 30,000 new teachers) is wasted due to inefficiency!
This article appears in Aug 19-25, 2009.