About 1,000 local elementary school students are getting a lesson in recycling the first month back at school. King County challenged students at Burien's Shorewood Elementary and Des Moines' North Hill Elementary to collect as many used plastic bags as possible in order to raise awareness of plastic bag recycling at grocery stores.

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On Wednesday, Oct. 12, King County announced the start of its second annual 'Bag your Bags. Bring 'em Back.' Campaign at North Hill Elementary School.

Students stuffed the bags collected from both schools into a yellow school bus. The bags were taken to a bag recycling facility.
The campaign is a partnership between the King County Solid Waste Division and local grocery stores to show residents the best way to recycle plastic bags.

"Most people have a stash of plastic bags at home, so we want to make sure those bags don't end up in the landfill," said Karen May, King County Solid Waste Division project manager. "The best way to recycle a whole variety of plastic bags is to bring them back to your local grocery store."

Some local communities accept plastic bags in the recycling cart; however, plastic bags and film collected at grocery stores stay cleaner and are easier to process. The bags are made into new products like decking, benches, playground structures and new plastic bags.
Approximately 49,000 tons of recyclable plastic bags and film were thrown into King County's landfill last year.

During the month of October, participating grocery stores will be promoting the 'Bag your Bags. Bring 'em Back.' campaign to encourage shoppers to stuff all their used plastic bags from home into a single bag, tie it up and drop them into a plastic bag collection container in the stores.

"Plastic grocery sacks aren't the only type of bag you can now recycle at the grocery store," says May. "You can also drop off clean and dry produce bags, bread bags, dry cleaning bags, bubble wrap, even the plastic wrapping from products like toilet paper and paper towels."

At the school today, once students stuff the bus, each grade level will guess how many bags were collected. Both participating schools will be presented with a Trex(r) bench made from recycled plastic bags.

Participating 2011 "Bag your Bags! Bring 'em Back" retailers include Fred Meyer, QFC, Top Food & Drug and the Duvall Family Grocer.

North Hill was the winner of the competition between the schools. The North Hill students collected 630 pounds of bags in a month.

Des Moines Mayor Bob Sheckler congratulated the students and told them they are "stewards of our resources."

For more information, visit www.bagyourbags.com.