Olathe South High School Events
The Students Going Green Handset Drive
Olathe South High School kicked off its Students Going Green Handset Drive at 11:30 a.m. Wednesday November 28 at a packed student assembly in the school's auditorium. Joe Caronia, the Master of Ceremonies entertained the students with a humorous presentation that educated the students about the need to recycle used cell phone handsets and their batteries. Caronia used a PowerPoint presentation to show the students what can happen to our groundwater supply if handsets are improperly disposed of in landfills. He also emphasized the destruction of critical habitats, especially in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), by the mining of Coltan, an important ingredient in cell phone manufacture. He pointed out how the Eastern Lowland Gorilla is being severely reduced in numbers as they are slaughtered for bush meat by the Coltan miners in the DRC. The 11:30 event, lasting about 20 minutes, was followed by 3 more presentations to accomodate the entire student body of the school.
After the presentation the students each took a Tyvek recycling bag into which they will place any used handsets they can get from friends and relatives during the next week. All handsets collected will be brought back to the school by Wednesday, Dec. 5 where they will be collected and sent to a recycling center to be either refurbished or disassembled to collect the chemicals and mineral components for reuse. All the proceeds gained from the recycling of the handsets will be divided equally between the school and the Nature Conservancy, a highly respected conservation organization recognized around the world for its tireless efforts in protecting critical habitats.
The top three students who bring in the most handsets will win a free Sony Ericsson S500i handset and 500 minutes per month for 6 months.
And... the results are in! The students of Olathe South High School brought in a total of 301 handsets. Here is the breakdown by class:
Sophomores - 37 cell phones
Juniors - 37 cell phones
Seniors - 227 cell phones
top 3 winners are:
Shannon Morgan - 87 cell phones
Sebastian Ploch - 49 cell phones
Geoff Cross - 42 cell phones
Congratulations!
By bringing in a total of 301 handsets, the students of Olathe South have saved a total of 12,040,000 gallons of water from possible contamination. That equals 30.1 basketball courts filled with 13 feet of water. Way to go South!
You can view the full Students Going Green PowerPoint presentation by Clicking Here.
To view photos from the Olathe South High School Handset Drive presentation Click Here.
Read about Olathle South's "Tray Day" - Click Here. |
