News item – Thetis Island wins, Cowichan Valley schools place high in BC recycling program

The 12 students and the teacher at Thetis Island elementary school have earned $750 in prize money from Encorp’s BC School Recycling Program for the 2010/2011 school year. The little island school not only won its enrollment category of 1 to 150 students – they beat out all other elementary schools in BC.

“The students and teachers earned a whopping $17,539 for their school from recycling containers,” says Sandy Sigmund, Chief Marketing Officer, Encorp Pacific (Canada). “This combined with the prize money made a grand total of $18,289 to go towards school programs and equipment.”

“This is a tremendous achievement for Thetis Island,” says school district superintendent Joe Rhodes. “It’s wonderful that our students and their families are helping the planet by recycling while at the same time raising money for their schools.”

Honorable mentions went to Duncan’s Alex Aiken, Cowichan Secondary, Drinkwater Elementary, Koksilah Elementary and Somenos Rural Traditional who collectively brought in 75,552 containers and raised $5,601 for their respective schools. Chemainus Secondary also received an honorable mention for collecting 67,081 containers and earning $4,658 in deposits.

Encorp’s BC School Recycling Program provides schools with the tools and resources to make recycling easy, convenient and profitable. Schools keep 100% of the deposit refunds for each container collected and the program costs the schools nothing. The schools are grouped into categories, based on enrollment, and the schools that collect the most containers in each category win extra cash prizes. As well, all top five schools from each enrollment category are recognized, with a year-end achievement certificate, and individual award certificates are available for “superstar recyclers” at elementary schools. Recognized elementary and secondary schools from all parts of BC are encouraged to participate.

This coming school year the prize money has increased. First prize will be raised to $1000, second prize $750 and third prize $500. Just go to www.return-it.ca/youthcentre/ for more information or to enter the Encorp School Recycling Program.