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Courtesy of Land Wilson
These student activists at Sun Valley School in San Rafael, Calif., are focused on getting Crayola to change its recycling ways. With them is group facilitator Land Wilson.
They may be small in stature, but kids at a California elementary school have gotten more than 55,000 people to sign an online petition asking Crayola to "take back" and recycle used plastic markers.
Don't get these 1st to 5th graders wrong -- they say they love Crayola products and are just looking to educate the company on how to lead industry and inspire others.
"We're asking Crayola to make sure these markers don't end up in our landfills, incinerators and oceans," the children said in their petition at Change.org.
Just a week old, the "Crayola, Make Your Mark!" petition came about when the "Green Team" at the Sun Valley School in San Rafael, Calif., started looking for a new project.
"The idea evolved from conversations with kids about plastic waste and they immediately identified with how many Crayola plastic markers they had thrown away," Land Wilson, the adult volunteer who facilitates the efforts, told msnbc.com. "Forty students eagerly stepped up and wanted to do something about the problem."
"We simply want Crayola to establish an easy take back program that kids can partake in -- i.e. prepaid return envelopes with their products or dropoff locations at retail outlets and schools," he added.
One man's trash is another man's treasure. Richard Lang and Judith Selby Lang are harvesting the plastic refuse littered on California's Kehoe Beach and turning it into beautiful, unique works of art. NBC's Mike Leonard reports.
Wilson said his own two children are huge Crayola marker fans. "Over the past 8 years, we have gone through approximately 500," he figured.
Crayola acknowledged the good intentions but said that, for now at least, there’s no practical way to take back and recycle entire markers.
"We value and encourage children to share their ideas and appreciate the suggestion that the students of Sun Valley brought to our attention," Crayola spokeswoman Stacy Gabrielle told msnbc.com. "At this time, we do not have the facilities or a process that will enable us to offer a take back program."
In describing Crayola's environmental initiatives, Gabrielle did note that the caps on each marker can be recycled at centers that take polypropylene, one of the least recyclable plastics.
Wilson said the children hoped Crayola would expand an internal program it has to recycle markers flawed on the production line.
Gabrielle did not address that directly, saying only that Crayola is not able "to take back and make new markers from used ones and provide consumers with a high quality marker that meets our rigorous safety standards for children."
So is an all-out boycott next? Don't hold your breath.
"We don't want to boycott because we love Crayola," Wilson said. "The environmental problems children hear about daily is long and they need a champion. What better champion than a company that they already know and love."
At Change.org, deputy campaign director Mike Jones said the petition has definitely caught on with users. "We've seen more than 15,000 petitions started on Change.org over the past month," he told msnbc.com, "and this campaign definitely ranks near the top this month in terms of how quickly it grew."
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#fail on Crayola's part. perhaps they need a new spokesperson. of course they don't have a way to facilitate recycling "at this time" That's what these kids are asking them to do, step up to the plate & create a system for recycling. They are Crayola after all. I thought they inspired creativity. I guess that doesn't apply to them though. I hope these kids don't give up and continue to encourage Crayola to become more environmentally responsible. Crayola owes it to these kids and their brand loyalty.
This is great. However, these efforts just make us feel good while we drive around in our SUVs.
Of course something that might make a real difference like a carbon tax are too much of a sacrifice for anyone to even consider.
Why do the recycled markers have to be used for new markers? Why can't they be used for other things, like storage containers that Crayola products come in, or lunch boxes? Surely Crayola has branded lunch boxes. If not, there's a new product idea for them. They can steal it all they want.
I think that the recycling effort is a great idea; however, let's face facts: this is Land Wilson's initiative. Anyone can go into a school with a bunch of 1st -5th Graders and "direct" them to the correct answer that he wants. We could have them all petitioning for an organic garden, or conversely, lobbying to convert old people to food (Soylent Green). I remember being in grade school and being part of the democratic process as "suggested" by adults. In this case, the cause is a good one; however, I'm a cynic and don't like Change.org potentially using kids as a form of marketing, nor did I like the "boycott" hint. Empower kids, but don't empower your organization through kids, Change.org.
I think you underestimate children. I have met some children who are very passionate about things like nature and saving the environment. I once met a little boy- 10 years old/5th grade- who taught me everything I ever wanted to know about crodicles, alligators and their habitat and why that habitat was in danger. He was very serious about wanting to save these animals. As an adult, I was facisnated that this child knew so much about the subject and actually cared. Yes, the adults around them do influence them, but don't underestimate kids choosing what they care about.
Everyone should send all their markers to these kids and let them take them apart for recycling. Then they can call themselves a green team.
Have these kids calculated how much energy and pollution would be generated collecting and shipping used markers for recycling?
Of course not. The object was to make kids feel good, not to actually solve any problems. Kids from the United States are scoring consistently high in self esteem and consistently low in math and science. That tells me they're dumb and they don't know it.
Writing from ignorance here; are Crayolas still made in the USA?
I do not remember plastic in the old Crayolas.
'economykiller' nailed it. The cost to collect and ship those things would negate any 'green' benefit. But then again, one wouldn't expect kids to be able to grasp that concept. Their teacher should be directing them to figure out something the class could use to make the used markers out of.
Sure and charge the Democratic party for the cost.
Who is brainwashing these kids? Politics should stay out of public schools. The teacher should be fired, and have their teaching certificate revoked. Same with the Principal.
PS: all you have to do is toss the pens in the recycler and they will be recycled.
Teachers should not indroctinate their kids with political ideas. The teacher must get their credentials stripped and the principal must be fired.
I honestly think this is a good idea, but once again it would be costly for crayola to go green, heck even use a option where they re-use cardboard boxes from their own product and in-exchange they get a cupon or something.
I THINK it would be good to recycle cayons.
Thank you for all of these comments whether they are in favor of the message of this petition or against it. If you have doubts about product stewardship and extended producer responsibility, I recommend a look at what the California Product Stewardship Council has to say. If you still have doubts, keep in mind that people believed that it was impossible to fly to the moon and get back safely. When we humans work together, we can accomplish unbelievable things. Getting control over our pollution issues is not rocket science. It is a matter of people working together for something great. As the Pope's scientific advisers have said, "we must protect the habitat that sustains us." Let's put our faith in each other and in what we can accomplish together. As eight year old Olivia says, "If we all came from the Earth... then why are we hurting it so much? Earth is all we have left."
Go on YouTube, and look up:
George Carlin, Saving The Planet.
That is nice that the children and grandchildren of illegals want to do something for the earth
Great... a new crop of wanna-be green upper-middle class hippies in the making...
Sounds like some well trained children. Get off the overblown green movement.
When are all these Green people going to get real and address the biggest part of the problem. Overpopulation, or the Infestation of Humans on the Earth as Mother Nature would describe it?
The Malignant Breeders are destroying the whole planet!! Lets deal with the problem, not another cure that will fix about .00000001% of the problem.
What is the recycling number on the item? There are already established processes for recycling most plastics. The school kids could easily set up a collection location at school for these items and other small plastic items that they have, and then periodically take them to their local recycling center. The cost would be minimal, and the cost of setting up a process for recovering and recycling a single item would be avoided. Keep it simple.
Yes..lets create more little "green" drones to recycle crap. Recycling has to be the biggest scam since social security. If we HAVE to recycle, lets get the prison inmates and welfare people down to the landfills and let THEM sort the crap out. The rest of us have real work to do.
You're sort of an ass, aren't you!
Not at all...I just dont believe in forced recycling. I was forced to recycle in NJ on the "promise" of lower taxes and that didnt happen, instead the city turned into recycling nazis and made money off of ticketing those who had ANY recyclable product in their garbage by putting a $75 ticket on it AND leaving it at your curb. I sat AGAIN...Recycling is a gigantic scam and i will never participate.
When Crayola bought my father's company, Silly Putty, I had an opportunity to meet with them, and as an elementary school teacher, I was all too conscious of the poor design of their markers. Not only are they round, which causes them to roll off tables and get lost, the tops are easily lost as well, causing them to dry up rapidly and become useless in no time. All of this works for Crayola of course. I suggested a flexible strip that would hold a set of them, flat in the package and linked to itself to assume a round, 'crown' base for all of the markers when kids are finished using them. Needless to say it got nowhere, as of course it made too much sense and would make the markers' lives longer, so we would buy fewer of them. I was not impressed with them, didn't get the feeling anyone cared about anything but profit. All selfishness is not 'enlightened' it would seem. A better design would be a set of little jars, all in a row, flip tops fixed to them, and old markers that are dipped in them.
Molly, if the standard design of every marker I see out there is "poor", then surely it is not just an issue for Crayola. I doubt the intent is to keep us buying markers. Submit your idea to other manufacturers. I find that as with any item we use in our daily lives, you have to pay attention to what you do with it. Put the cap on after use the same as you would a water bottle and put it in it's place the same as you do your toothbrush. Things cannot keep themselves in order. I note that your suggestions involve creating more plastic that will have to be dealt with which I think was the fabricated issue to begin with.
Molly Cruz, I believe you are right on. When I was a kid, if we left a cap off and a marker dried out, we would pull the top off and add a little water to make the ink tube inside moist again. Nowadays, when my kids leave the lids off, I have tried to get the those tops off and can't for the life of me. I'm sure Crayola found out that people were "fixing" their dried out markers and put an end to it by making the tops impossible to get off. If we can fix our dried out markers, less money for Crayola!
Dayna, puncture it, put your water and tape it shut. If you are that determined, if there is a will, there is a way.
the plastic markers should be thrown in sea to feed the turtels.
Why can't they make markers that have removable tops and then sell new ink tubes that go inside? That's the part that gets used up, not the actual marker. And I think that Molly Cruz is right about Crayola wanting us to buy new markers as often as possible because when I was a kid, if we left the lid off and a marker dried out, we could take the tops off and add a little water to make it work again. Now the markers tops don't come off no matter what you do, so when my kids leave the tops off, the markers have to be thrown out and new ones bought. You can't tell me that Crayola didn't find out that people were restoring their dried out markers and put an end to it.