Charlie Stern, a junior at East Hampton High School, brought an unusual proposal to the East Hampton School Board on Tuesday night: to use metal utensils, rather than plastic, in the school’s cafeteria.
In a pilot program that he has been running since he was a freshman, Charlie has determined that the school has thrown out over 100,000 plastic utensils, he told the board.
“I’ve always been concerned about the environment, I’ve always cared about the environment,” he said. “Living in a beach community, seeing trash on the beaches, it made me upset.”
He was especially concerned by how much plastic he saw being used and wasted at lunchtime, he said, and began thinking about how to make the cafeteria more sustainable. Sara Smith, the high school principal, encouraged him to pursue this further.
Charlie has since led two pilot programs. The first ran into a few pitfalls, and he came up with “a better plan,” he said, for this year’s trial, which ran from Jan. 13 to Feb. 20. At one lunch period during that time, metal utensils were used.
One goal was to test the practicality of adding metal to the school’s ecosystem; another, to see how students would react. “We learned from our mistakes last year,” Charlie said, “and during this year’s trial we experienced less loss than the year before and saw more student adaptation.”
By “loss” he meant how many metal utensils disappeared during the lunch period. Forks were the most commonly used utensil, he found, and the program tracked how many made it back to be cleaned.
“On Day One, there were 12 forks that were lost, and this was expected,” he told the school board. “Compared to Day 20, the final day of the trial, we lost about one fourth of that.”
“Charlie, quick question,” said Sarah Minardi, a board member. “Do you think they lost so many that first day just because they were so used to throwing them out?”
“I think so, yeah,” he responded, but noted that a few other factors could have contributed to the loss, such as students leaving the forks in food containers that were later thrown out by cafeteria staff.
A group of students volunteered, receiving community service hours, to stay after school and clean the utensils for the next day. “This won’t be feasible going forward,” Charlie said. The forks, knives, and spoons will go into the cafeteria dishwasher instead.
Charlie also suggested bringing in collection bins, similar to the garbage bins being used now, that could be wheeled around for students to deposit their used silverware.
School officials and administrators were clearly impressed by the teenager’s presentation. “I don’t see a reason why we shouldn’t do this,” said School Superintendent Adam Fine, who has been consulting with Charlie on the proposal.
Emily Agnello, a board member, asked Charlie whether he had consulted with the cafeteria staff during the pilot program. He said he had, and with the custodial staff as well. Both “seemed excited” about the change, he said. “They “were super friendly and willing to help.”
Mr. Fine assured him that he and the board will “take care of the legwork,” meaning reaching out to the food provider, and that Charlie himself will be in charge of student education. “I told Charlie he’s responsible for the signage [posters],” Mr. Fine said. “We’ll order it, but he’s got to put it up.” He mentioned using the morning announcements also, and emails, to inform students about the changes.
“I’d hire [Charlie] if he was a little older,” Mr. Fine concluded.
Also at Tuesday’s meeting, the principal and the board recognized this year’s valedictorian, Abraham Stillman, and salutatorian, Ava Tintle. Abe has over 820 community service hours, mainly from playing in the Sag Harbor Community Band. Ava, in addition to doing advanced research on brain activity resulting from different types of language, is an accomplished lacrosse player who goes to West Babylon twice a week to play on a travel team.
Both students have weighted grade-point averages over 100 and have excelled in A.P. courses. Ava will matriculate at Washington and Lee University in Lexington, Va., in the fall, and Abe will attend Columbia University, majoring in biology.