SF Environment Honors Local Schools with Environmental Excellence Awards

San Francisco was the first city in the world to put green bins in school cafeterias. Now, more than 85% of city schools participate in SF Environment’s Food to Flowers! Lunchroom Composting Program, which teaches kids that composting and recycling help protect nature and the environment. Every year, SF Environment presents an Environmental Excellence Award to four local schools that have excelled with composting and recycling at school.

At the School Award Ceremony at City Hall on April 30, SF Environment honored Dr. George Washington Carver Elementary School, Monroe Elementary School, Ulloa Elementary School, and James Denman Middle School. SF Environment’s kids’ mascot Phoebe the Phoenix made a special appearance to congratulate the students. 

Dr. George Washington Carver Elementary has made composting and recycling an important activity for all students. Earlier this month, their third grade student named Malaya won a composting art contest. SF Environment turned her art into a poster and handed it out to people in her community. Thanks to their administration's dedication and students' efforts, recycling and composting are a regular activities at school. 

Monroe Elementary School has been composting and recycling for almost 10 years! That means they were one of the very first schools to compost in San Francisco, and since then, almost every other public elementary school in the city has joined them. They also have a garden and an outdoor classroom that was built using natural and recycled materials.

Ulloa Elementary School is one of the top composting schools in the district. They compost and recycle almost 75% of what they throw away! On top of that, students at Ulloa work in a thriving garden and have gone on many field trips to see composting and recycling in action.

James Denman Middle School is the one of the first middle schools ever to win this award! Students in their Environmental Club monitor the green and blue bins in the cafeteria to encourage other students to use them correctly. They are also lucky to have a wonderful school garden, and get to go on many environmental field trips throughout the year.