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It’s Back to School Time!

September is back to school month and there are plenty of ways to Reduce, Reuse and Recycle. Below are some tips and tricks to save yourself money and protect the environment when you are returning to school.

• Unless you use up all of your notepads during the school year, it is very easy to buy a new full notepad. We can guarantee that going through your old notepads you will find a huge number of blank pages completely unused. A good tip is to go through old notepads and remove the blank sheets of paper and staple the top together. There you go, a completely new notepad.

 

• Avoid using cling film to cover food in your lunchbox as this is harmful for the environment. The manufacture of plastic uses up limited resources that are not replaced naturally. A good alternative to using cling film is brown or greaseproof paper.
  Make sure your children are recycling their waste properly in school, or else tell them to bring it home to recycling properly at home.

 

• Sharing is caring. If you no longer need books from the previous year, either keep them for a younger sibling that will need it or else find out if a student in the year below will need it. Not only are school books extremely expensive to buy every year it is a nice idea to pass down to other students or family members.
• Buy refillable pens and pencils. There is nothing worse than having a cheap pen explode ink all over your new shirt and school bag. Invest in refillable pens and pencils, this will save you having to buy new pens and pencils every year.

 

• Cover your books with brown paper, this is a great way to keep your books in good condition if you are to pass them on next year. It is also a fun way for kids to design their own book covers.

 

• Invest in BPA free water bottles. Reusing a plastic water bottle can be very harmful to your health and harmful for the environment. BPA is the resin used in plastic to prevent it from breaking down. There are plenty of colourful and decorative BPA free kids bottles to choose from, which make them way more fun and safe to drink from than your regular sports bottle.

 

To make sure you are recycling correctly at home, have a look at our ‘What Goes in My Bin?‘ section on the Barna Recycling website.