Absegami Environmental Group Collects Over 100 Flip-Flops for Recycling

Earth Shepherd Environmental Group of Absegami High School conducted its first fundraiser over the fall, collecting over 100 flip-flops to be recycled, according to Earth Shepherd President Jamie Infanti.

The group teamed up with the Smithville and Reeds Road elementary schools in the collection effort. According to Infanti, the flip-flops will be recycled by TerraCycle Inc. into items such as trash bins, flooring and park benches.

TerraCycle is a national recycling group that specializes in recycling previously non-recyclable material or material that is hard to recycle. It was founded in 2001 by Pirnceton University freshman Tom Szaky.

“I saw a sign for the TerraCycle flip-flop recycling program at an Old Navy store and thought it would be a fun and different way to recycle and to encourage other people to do the same,” said Infanti, a 16-year-old sophomore at Absegami who started the Earth Shepherd group this year. “(The flip flop drive) seemed like something that would be easy for people to do and something that people would respond to.”

Infanti contacted the principals of the elementary schools by email, and the principals of Smithville and Reeds Road embraced the idea. They handed out flyers and made announcements reminding their students to contribute flip-flops to the bins, which were placed at the elementary schools over a two week period in October and November.

“We were impressed by how enthusiastic the two elementary schools were for helping us get started on one of our first major projects,” Infanti said via email. “Our hope is that these drives will help teach elementary school students the importance of recycling and each year we will gain more and more momentum throughout the school district.”

Infanti started the Earth Shepherd group this year to fill a void at the high school.

“The inspiration to start Earth Shepherd at Absegami was from there not being an environmental club at the school already. I had a strong interest in making the extremely important environmental movement part of Absegami, and I am hoping to inspire other kids my age to take some initiative and show some interest in their world,” Infanti said. “The group's ultimate goal is to make our community and environment better through community service, becoming educated about environmental issues and spreading awareness on why taking care of our environment is so important. We hope that by being a common presence in our community we will show people that we care and that this issue is important. In the future, we want to do more awareness events in our school, the lower level schools and the overall community. We hope to form even more of our own projects and work to make them successes. “