The mission of our Project Roots Compost Program is to serve as a model for a sustainable means of urban waste reduction. At I.S. 318, this goal is achieved by reducing the organic waste stream in the kitchen, student dining areas and teacher's cafeteria. Each school day the waste that is separated is transported in buckets to our community garden where our students weigh it, estimate volume, chop it and mix it with brown organic material (wood chips, leaves or saw dust) for decomposition . The recycled soil is then used in Brooklyn gardens. We have conducted several school waste audits and it is estimated that through our program we divert 10% of the total cafeteria waste, by weight, from a trip to the landfill. The data from our 1999/2000 program indicates that this amounts to 44 pounds a day (up 9 pounds from two years ago) or approximately 7,500 pounds in an academic year (44 lbs x 175 full school days)!
The Compost Program originally began in the fall of 1995 in response to the impending closure of the Fresh Kills Landfill as a collaboration between I.S. 318 and the "Training Student Organizers Program" (TSO) of Council on the Environment of New York City. Concern that the lack of landfill space will have a negative impact on NYC and increase truck traffic in our neighborhood has attracted students to the program; each year a team of as many as 50 students reach out to citizens through workshops, presentations and building projects. The program is sustained by turn-key teaching whereby seniors train younger students (lesson plans). In the summer of 1998 the Project Roots Garden began accepting organic waste from other sources in the community and we now work with other sites to assist in custom waste reduction systems.
In the Fall of 1998 Open Road of NY enlisted I.S. 318 to expand their work with compost systems into Brooklyn. In the spring of 1999 I.S. 318 eighth grade interns working with consultants from Open Road of NY designed a bin for all season outdoor use (photos can be accessed below). One bin was created for the Ecology Village Garden in Gateway National Park in Brooklyn's Floyd Bennett Field. This bin is used mainly to reduce food waste generated from their camping program. The Project Roots garden is currently operating their compost program while testing various compost bin designs. Another bin was built by our team and delivered by New York Botanical Gardens to Passages Academy in the Bronx. In the spring of 2000 Open Road staff and students built compost bins for JFK H.S./Enchanted Garden and Project Grow of City As School H.S. Both bins were delivered with the help of GreenThumb.
Historically I.S. 318 maintained six "hot boxes", one outdoor worm bin and one classroom worm box. The Hot Box designs have been modified from a patented design created by the students and staff of Open Road of New York, Inc. IS 318 and Project Roots continues to collect waste for composting to this day. For more up-to-date information on their program please contact the school directly.
Open Road of New York has a rich history of designing sustainable systems through participatory design projects. Roy Arezzo continued to work with Open Road after leaving IS 318 to assist gardens and schools with compost related projects. One of the larger projects completed more recently involved upgrading the compost system Garden Of Union in Brooklyn to handle the waste stream of the Park Slope Food COOP. Ongoing work involves connecting community groups and individuals with sites to compost their organic waste such as the Clinton Hill CSA. Community Gardens are one resource for reducing neighborhood waste streams. Check your local garden to see if they have the means to compost your kitchen scraps. Local Botanical Gardens also have resources so you can compost at home or put out certain organic waste (leaves, christmas trees, pumpkins) for Department of Sanitation pick-up.
COMPOST LESSON PLANS for schools - click here!| COMPOST INFO | Blue Water Recycling Assoc.(Canada) Compost Basics + tips on compost bin designs and recipes |
| CITY FARMER | Canadian urban agriculture link with several compost entries regarding worms, food scraps and resources |
| COMPOST MESSAGE BOARD | Communicate with other individuals/schools who are composting. Compost products + Great links! |
| NYC DEPT. OF SANITATION | Continuous updates of the proposed Staten Island Fresh Kills Landfill Closing/NYC waste management plans |
| WORM DIGEST | Publication which specializes in vermi-culture, learn all there is to know about worms - pics, links and more |
| WORM TOUR | Worm Digest starting point for the worm tour - the tour consists of links and links on compost |
| E.D.F. | How to get involved with compost in your school. Links to "hotbox" design. |
| COMPOST EXPERIMENTS | A few compost activities for students/teachers. Most appropriate for grades 4-8. |
| TARGET SCIENCE | Waste management curriculum guide for teachers |
| GARBAGE CRISIS | The rotten truth about trash, landfills, waste transfer stations. Waste management problems and solutions. |
| CORNELL COMPOSTING | Informative site complete with start up and advanced information, data base and NY site maps |
| CORNELL COMPOSTING, SCHOOLS | All of the above plus info specific for school composting |
| CORNELL WASTE MANAGEMENT INSTITUTE | More compost info and links from Cornell |
| RESOURCE RECYCLING MAGAZINE | Publication dedicated to recycling, compost and waste management |
| BIOCYCLE MAGAZINE | Tech publication for the hardcore compost types |
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