MCHS is garbage at recycling

By Maddy Meekins, A&E editor

Used tampons. Phone cases. Bananas. Whole sandwiches. These are just some of the strange things that President of Marine Biology Club, senior Megan Chang has seen when sorting through the new Maria Carrillo High School recycling bins. Chang said she was “appalled that people don’t know how to recycle.”

When Chang started Marine Biology Club last year, her original intent was to “spread awareness about ocean conservation.” 

Chang and her team decided to take this on in a bigger way after she noticed that there weren’t any places to recycle outside, where the majority of the student population spends their lunch and break. After reaching out to multiple organizations that refused to help with funding for the bins, Chang was referred to Zero Waste Sonoma where she met Thora Collard, Zero Waste Sonoma’s Administrative Manager who facilitated the purchasing and delivery of the bins to MCHS over the summer.

However, the role of Marine Biology Club in this overtaking wasn’t over. Every Tuesday and Thursday during Advocacy club members pull on gloves and carry the recycled material back by the dumpsters on campus to carefully sort through it determining what is truly recycling and what is waste. It would be fair to say that they have seen some things. Half-eaten peaches and perfect-condition Nalgene water bottles should not be in the recycling! 

Chang asked students to just take a moment out of their day to look at the tops of the bins which notify them of what is and is not considered recyclable.

When asked about potential future projects such as acquiring compost bins on campus, Chang said that she hopes that another group on campus takes that challenge on because Marine Biology Club could not maintain both programs alone and that is not the role of their club on campus today.