CBC News: Scores of children help divert beach garbage from landfill
Field-tripping children and volunteers race to clear a warehouse of recyclables
By Rafferty Baker, CBC News Posted: Oct 14, 2016 11:09 AM PTLast Updated: Oct 14, 2016 11:09 AM PT
Chloe Dubois with Ocean Legacy Foundation stands in front of a pile of Styrofoam sorted by groups of children, (Krista Tulloch)
Groups of school children have been pitching in to help the Ocean Legacy Foundation keep tonnes of waste gathered on Vancouver Island beaches from winding up in the dump.
The garbage was gathered by several groups of volunteers over the spring and summer and hauled to the Lower Mainland on barges for sorting and disposal.
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About half of the waste was brought to Delta by the Living Oceans Society, but the rest has been stored in a South Vancouver warehouse temporarily donated by Lush Cosmetics.
The Ocean Legacy Foundation has until the end of this weekend to clear the warehouse, according to its acting president, Chloe Dubois.
Krista Tulloch is a teacher from North Vancouver and an organizer with B.C. Field Trips. She put the call out to teachers to bring their students to the warehouse to help sort through the junk.
Several classes have answered that call, with 35 students from False Creek Elementary sorting through the junk last week, 120 Grade 4 and 5 students from Norma Rose Point School stopping by the warehouse on Thursday, and another 75 children from Surrey Christian School will help on Friday.
Children from Norma Rose Point School hoisted a plastic pipe above their heads during a garbage sorting field trip on Thursday. (Krista Tulloch)
“We had 60 students in the morning pile up a gigantic mountain of Styrofoam, and that made sure that by last night that mountain was going to be moved out of the warehouse and onto its recycling site,” said Tulloch.
“Then in the afternoon another 60 little hands — or 60 little bodies — helped to bale all of the hard plastic that had been sorted by volunteers.”
“They’re just like little bees buzzing about, and ‘boop,’ given really clear directions, they do an amazing job,” she said.
Dubois agreed that the children have been a great help.