SCHOOL COMPOSTING: WASTE BUSTERS SCHOOL YEARS 24-25 & 25-26

Project: Composting Project #4: Waste Busters 24-25 & 25-26

Location: Five local elementary schools and one middle school:

• Central Elementary School, Lexington, VA

• Enderly Heights Elementary School, Buena Vista, VA

• Fairfield Elementary School, Fairfield, VA

• Maury River Middle School, Lexington, VA

• Mountain View Elementary School, Buena Vista, VA

• Natural Bridge Elementary School, Natural Bridge Station, VA

Status: 21,701 lbs of food waste composted during the 2024-2025 & 2025-2026 school years

Project Period: 2 school years

Total metric tons of anticipated carbon dioxide emissions (MTCO2eq) prevented: 63 tons

Value: $120 per metric ton

COREworks offsets available for allocation: 63

This project involved five elementary schools and one middle school within the Rockbridge County area, five of which belong to the Rockbridge County Public Schools (Central Elementary, Fairfield Elementary, Mountain View Elementary, Natural Bridge Elementary, and Maury River Middle School) and one of which belongs to the Buena Vista City Public Schools (Enderly Heights Elementary). Collectively, these schools serve children preschool to eighth grade. During the 24-25 and 25-26 School Years, all six schools participated in daily, school-based composting through a Boxerwood program called Waste Busters, which is the focus of this application. 

Prior to this project, these six schools sent all waste, including food scraps, to the Rockbridge Regional Landfill. Decomposition of food in anaerobic landfills generates and releases methane into the atmosphere. Methane is a powerful greenhouse gas (GHG) that contributes to climate change. Composting practices, on the other hand, eliminate most methane production. In the case of this project, 99.99% of anticipated methane was avoided. Thus, composting is a more environmentally friendly waste management practice. 

As part of the Waste Buster program, Boxerwood functions as a composting ally, providing (and owning) equipment, supplies, and ongoing coaching for each school. To that end, BEA provides 1-2 Earth Cube composting units for each school, for the purpose of creating compost from cafeteria food waste. The resulting compost soil belongs to the school that produced it, with the schools using the finished compost to support other ongoing school projects such as fertilizing school gardens or landscape projects. Implementing a composting program thus supports broader service-learning goals at these schools. 

At Central ES, BEA determined that a different composting collecting model would better suit the needs of this school. Due to the school’s large size and volume of food waste, Boxerwood determined the Earth Cubes would not have sufficient composting capacity. Thus, BEA contracted a local farmer who has experience with successful composting efforts, Shanti Leasure, to pick up four to six 5-gallon buckets of food waste twice per week from Central. Mr. Leasure transported the buckets back to his farm where he maintains an informal composting operation with his chickens. For the Maury River MS composting pilot, Mr. Leasure also picked up from Maury River MS twice weekly. 

BEA staff worked with each school to customize a food waste collection system that would be both efficient and effective. While details vary, the general concept is the same at every school: 

1) Orientation & Training: Boxerwood educators provide orientation to students through classroom presentations and initial, real-time coaching; 

2) Ongoing Collection: School staff help students sort their leftovers into buckets in the cafeteria at the end of each lunch. Either students or school staff then immediately weigh the waste buckets, recording data in their respective school’s Waste Busters binder.

3) Composting: Student leaders (or staff) empty the full buckets into their composter (or in the case of Central and Maury River, deposit the bucket on the school loading dock for farmer pick-up), then return the buckets to the cafeteria for cleaning.

Typically all students in 3rd through 5th grade (total 540 students) participate in the Waste Busters program at the elementary level, though sometimes additional grades participated for portions of the 24-26 project period. In the case of Maury River MS, all 6th graders participated (180 students). 

During the 24-26 school year, students at the six participating schools collectively diverted 21,701.45 lbs of food waste from the landfill. This diversion is equivalent to preventing the release of 63 metric tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Notably, the Earth Cube composters functioned well, as did Mr. Leasure’s composting system. All food waste successfully decomposed to compost soil by the end of Summer 2025 and Summer 2026. Material inside  the Earth Cube composters cured inside the composters over the summer ahead of removal from the Cubes. With a successful food diversion/composting outcome, this project therefore generated 63 offsets. 

This project has met COREworks standards of integrity as assessed by both the internal and external (community) review protocol. 

Review the approved Composting Project #4 application to COREworks ►

Review the COREworks Registry Confirmation ►