A three-year-old club is Revere’s fastest growing. Looking to kick start good habits in school, this club draws students of all grades for one common purpose: recycling.
The Recycling Club meets every Friday after school to collect recycling bins from each classroom. They carry it in barrels to the school’s larger recycling bins outside. This club is quickly becoming one of the largest student groups at Revere.
Adviser Diane Gerspacher leads Recycling Club. She supports the overall goal of the Recycling Club to reduce the amount of trash in the school. She sees the members running the club without much interference needed.
“Students go around and pick up the recycling that’s been accumulated throughout the week. . . it’s very student-led,” Gerspacher said.
Since the club has so many members, there are three presidents in charge of different aspects of running it. Noah Restivo, Aiden Choi and Sydney Firca all delegate the responsibilities that come with running a club between themselves so that they can accomplish more. Restivo talked about his responsibilities as a leader in the club.
“I am one of the three co-presidents of the club. I make sure at the actual meetings . . . everyone’s recycling gets picked up. There are two other co-presidents. Aiden’s in charge of communications, getting merchandise out there and informing people, and then Sydney helps a lot with attendance,” Restivo said.
The club has grown exponentially this year compared to previous ones. The members put more effort into different methods of reaching more people, therefore the numbers have more than doubled. They used resources like Frosh Fest, an opportunity for incoming freshmen to sign up for clubs.
“We went from probably having forty members, maybe even less than that, to 115. I think what we did differently was Frosh Fest. We had a table, and we made everyone that came to our table sign up for the Remind,” Firca said.
Since Recycling Club experienced such an increase in members, they had to come up with
new strategies to make the club efficient. Having too many people in the hallway would make it harder for the club to get things done, so they split into groups. These groups alternate which week they recycle.
“We had to split up the groups to A and B. So half the group is A and half the group is B because you can’t have 115 people going around the halls,” Firca said.
Splitting the groups was not random. The leaders of the club tried to ensure an even split so that the club members would be satisfied with their groupings.
“We kept it 50/50. . . . We tried to keep some that had been upperclassmen and underclassmen in both. It was just kind of throwing people’s names back and forth just trying to split up,” Firca said.
Due to the large population, the club has a healthy social aspect to it, too. The club manages to maintain a fun and inclusive atmosphere while getting their work done. A lot of people join the group to interact with their friends after school. This helps the club by giving it more members. While this is the more fun side of the club, they still carry an overarching spirit of recycling.
“[The club] has a lot of friends, and there are a lot of people who enjoy going to the club for socialization. But it’s very friendly, very casual, but we always get done what we’re supposed to get done,” Restivo said.
Although the main objective of the Recycling Club is taking out recycling at the school, they also participate in numerous other activities related to recycling. They create new merchandise for their club using illustrations that one of last year’s presidents, Philip Liu, created. Additionally, they collaborate with clubs like the National Honors Society, helping with their Lorax themed winter formal this year.
“I believe we are planning on doing another merch sale. That would actually involve a new design, our T-shirt design has their little T-rexes recycling, and our new design would involve a different dinosaur that Phillip actually drew. We’re looking forward to that. And then a little bit in the future, we have the NHS dance that we’re going to help set up to tear down,” Restivo said.
With growing numbers, the Recycling Club is looking to expand their scope. They are looking into new ways to bring more recycling to Revere in order to make the school a more sustainable place.
“It would be nice if we could somehow figure out a way to recycle more stuff in the cafeteria,” Gerspacher said.
As the number of activities the club participates in grows, so does the meaning of the club as a whole. It is evolving past recycling and towards a broader message about conservation efforts.
“This year, we’re starting to try and get more involved in conservation efforts. [The club is] actually becoming more about the environment as a whole, not just recycling,” Restivo said.
The Recycling Club is expanding in every way this year with new members and new activities. As the club continues its growth, the presidents and members hope to continue the momentum by participating even more in recycling related activities.
