Keep America Beautiful and EREF partner to reduce school-based food waste

Keep America Beautiful, a national community improvement nonprofit organization based in Stamford, Connecticut, and the Environmental Research & Education Foundation (EREF), a nonprofit organization with the mission is to advance scientific research and education for sustainable solid waste management practices based in Raleigh, North Carolina, have signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) that outlines an agreement to join efforts on quantifying food waste in K-12 schools. In addition, the MOU outlines the organizations’ aim to provide tools and resources that help reduce school-based food waste.

Keep America Beautiful and EREF say they will work together on areas of mutual interest to collect and analyze information about the amount of food waste generated at these institutions; foster education and awareness about how food waste is generated and can be minimized by K-12 schools nationally; and develop and share best practices and other resources to reduce food waste generation and to divert  materials from landfills. This partnership supports EREF’s School Cafeteria Discards Assessment Project (SCrAP), a program that quantifies food waste and other related waste generated in K-12 school cafeterias nationally.

“At Keep America Beautiful, we strive to educate and empower future generations of community and environmental stewards,” says Brenda Pulley, senior vice president of recycling, Keep America Beautiful. “Working together with EREF, we will gain a better understanding of the quantity and quality of food waste streams at schools and how to tackle reducing food waste.”

As part of this collaboration, EREF will help raise awareness of Keep America Beautiful’s RecycleBowl program, the national in-school recycling competition for K-12 schools, with specific focus on the food waste category of the competition. Schools can register now for the fall RecycleBowl competition, which begins on Oct. 16. In turn, Keep America Beautiful will support EREF’s recruitment of eligible K-12 schools for its SCrAP program as well as provide other available waste data for inclusion in appropriate reports.

“Education is a core component of EREF’s mission, and an understanding of waste generation in schools can provide valuable insight into how waste practices and education can be improved,” says Bryan Staley, CEO and president of EREF. “We hope the program will enlighten schools regarding not only food waste, but all discarded materials, including recycling. Partnering with Keep America Beautiful will allow EREF to engage schools with a strong interest in more efficiently managing their waste.”