RECYCLING EXPERT TRIES TO CHANGE ATTITUDES ABOUT TRASH

For too many years, Americans have viewed trash as ... well, trash. Stan Slaughter says it's time to consider the value of garbage.

"People have been trained to throw it away -- it's trash," Slaughter told fifth-graders at Franklin Elementary Wednesday morning. "We have got to learn to regard it as something valuable."

Trash typically includes metal, glass, plastic and paper that can be recycled, he explained, reducing the amount of trash going to landfills and preserving natural resources used in manufacturing new items to replace those thrown away.

Slaughter, formerly a science teacher, is teaching about recycling in Cape Girardeau schools this week.

He is co-founder of the Heartland All Species Project out of Kansas City. The group received a grant through the Missouri Department of Natural Resources Solid Waste Division to provide education programs.

At Franklin Elementary, he is conducting a recycling residency. Assemblies have been scheduled at Jefferson and Washington Elementary schools.

"Our project is designed to help people understand by bringing information at them from all different sources -- arts and sciences. If you start talking statistics on recycling you won't get very far.

"There is the `ugh' factor to get the kid's attention," he said. "Plus I'm new and have a guitar and look a little different."

So he and students sing "The Garbage Blues" and talk about trash.

For example, he brought a huge garbage bag filled with assorted trash to class Wednesday.

One billion two-liter soda bottles are manufactured each day, he said. "They are not recycled. They can be reused for other purposes, like carpet," Slaughter said. "But they are not recycled, used again for the same purpose."

He dug out an empty engine oil plastic quart container. "Each oil change requires four of these or maybe five," Slaughter said. "Bulk packaging would be better."

"The most hazardous thing you do to yourself every day? Hair spray. If it's strong enough to hold your hair together all day, think about what it does to your rosy pink lungs. If you can smell it, you've inhaled it."

He said 54 percent of aluminum cans are thrown away. "The highest concentration of aluminum is in landfills in the United States," said Slaughter.

Laws are changing concerning trash and landfills, providing an economic incentive for recycling.

He also cautioned students to question the facts and figures he presented along with information from other sources. "Use your head. Does it make sense? Does it sound right?"

Franklin fifth-grade teacher Debbie Mehner said as part of the week-long program, students are keeping garbage logs -- a list of all the things they throw away for the entire week.

They are also creating garbage gremlins -- art projects made from trash.

Slaughter said the program said letters offering the program were mailed to principals throughout the state. "It was a first-come, first-served arrangement," he said. "Franklin was among the first to respond."