Harold Oliver Primary, Portland, Oregon (K-3)

Green School – Fall 1998
Merit School – Spring 1999
Premier School awarded May 2000
Premier School renewed March 2003
Average yearly savings from waste reduction and energy conservation since 1993: $3,428

Harold Oliver Primary is part of the first Green School District in Oregon, the Centennial School District. This school district has worked hard to have all of its 9 schools become Green Schools. Resource Conservation Team meetings are held monthly with a representative from each school, district administrators, the local waste hauler and city recycling coordinator in attendance.

Harold Oliver Primary has the honor of having renewed at the highest level of Green School: a Premier School. HOP has several staff members that share the role of recycling coordinator. Even though the school only goes up to the 3rd grade, students are still an integral part of waste reduction. Second graders oversee the recycling process in the cafeteria, and a second grade class maintains a worm bin to process fruit and vegetable waste.

Every year, students are taught proper recycling procedures for the cafeteria and classroom. Reduce, reuse and recycle themes are incorporated into the curriculum. Speakers are invited to the school to speak about natural resource use and to conduct regular waste audits. School-wide assemblies include waste reduction and recycling reminders as well as recognition for work done well.

Reaching out to the community is important to the staff and students at HOP. After students watched Metro’s puppet show “Mother Nature’s Garden” at school, information about natural gardening was shared with parents and families. For four years students have decorated local grocery store bags for Earth Day. In 2002, student Patrick Petrie designed a winning entry in Metro’s annual Earth Day Billboard Art Contest. His art encouraged 35,000 commuters a day to garden naturally.

When school coordinators meet with others at district-wide Conservation Team meetings, they establish individual school and district goals. Each year, HOP has met these goals. Part of these goals included working to be more inventive with their program. In 1999, students and staff worked together to create a recycling showcase display that was put up at the district office and at several other schools to help educate others about how recycling is accomplished at HOP. In 2000, the school established a compost system in which red worms feed on lunchtime fruit and vegetable waste. The school uses the vermicompost in their Global Garden, a large student-planted garden representing regions around the world.

Harold Oliver Primary School closes the loop by buying items with recycled content, including copy paper, garbage bags, paper towels and plates and utensils. The school’s commitment to conservation is summed up in their recycling mission statement:

“At Harold Oliver Primary, we believe that we are in charge of the earth. We will do our part by recycling our papers, lunch plates, spoons, forks, cans, boxes and newspaper. The things we are using from the earth we will give back to our precious earth by RECYCLING.”