Placing recycling bins in each classroom and office, Brownstown Central High School has made an effort to recycle as much as possible on a daily basis.

The agriculture department teamed with a local organization and built Christmas trees and stars of various sizes out of old wood from the Ewing Depot. Those items were sold at a local business, and the money went toward the depot’s restoration project.

Also, metal cans used in the cafeteria and plastic soft drink bottles are collected and picked up by local solid waste management officials on a regular basis.

Blake Hackman, agriculture teacher and FFA adviser at the school, submitted those recycling efforts for the 3R Challenge. The competition involves a school creating and implementing a new recycling program and showing how it promotes the three Rs of environmental stewardship — reduce, reuse and recycle.

An overall winner is chosen and presented $500, while two other schools receive $250 each. In his proposal, Hackman said if Brownstown won, it would use the money to construct an educational recycling exhibit for the county FFA’s Young MacDonald’s Farm building during the Jackson County Fair.

A committee decided Brownstown had the winning combination, and officials recently visited the school to present the winnings.

“I’m shocked that we won,” Hackman said. “I didn’t know what they were looking for. Someone just sent me an email, sent me the form and said, ‘Why don’t you fill that out?’ I know we did a lot (to recycle), and I’d like to get another bin here (outside of the building).”

St. Ambrose Catholic School and Redding Elementary School, both in Seymour, were the $250 winners.

This was the third year of the program, which is sponsored by Best Way Disposal and organized by the Greater Seymour Chamber of Commerce’s recycling committee. This marked Best Way’s second year of sponsorship.

“Recycling is so big for our community. It’s an issue for Best Way Disposal, too,” said Michelle Stephens, an account manager with the company. “So when they asked us if we wanted to go ahead and sponsor that, of course we jumped right on board. There were no questions asked about it.”

Only Seymour schools were involved the first two years, but Bernie Bryant with the Seymour Department of Public Works helped encourage other county schools to participate this year.

While Brownstown is proud of its recycling efforts, sophomores in Hackman’s plant and soil science class are most excited about working on the fair exhibit, which they have given the theme “It’s easy.”

“We’re just trying to promote recycling within Jackson County and trying to educate the public on how to recycle and how easy it actually is,” Richayla Huff said.

Students came up with different concepts for the exhibit. For example, Billy Champion thought of putting together soup and soda cans to make it look like a dog, while Jacob Tormoehlen designed a paddle boat made out of 2-liter bottles.

Hackman said his hope is to place a character in front of the building to draw people in to learn about recycling.

Another idea is to create a colorful mural using lids from recycled items.

The class also wants to create a shock factor with a 12-foot-by-8-foot wall with items, such as a diaper and a boot, and explaining how long it takes for them to decompose in a landfill.

“It’s just kind of like it will be so ugly, everybody will stop and just say, ‘Whoa!’” Huff said.

“I’d say that people will stop and look at it and they’ll realize that it’s going to be bad for the Earth and it takes that long for the boots or the cans or diapers to decompose,” Champion said. “They’ll think twice before just throwing it away or throwing it out the window.”

Tormoehlen said it’s all about spurring more people to recycle.

“Hopefully, people will see how easy it is to recycle and get their mind set on it, and hopefully, they’ll start recycling in the future,” he said.

Hackman recently asked his class how many of them recycle at home, and only 40 percent of them raised their hand. He’s hoping to raise that number.

“I think after we go through this and we construct this exhibit, maybe they’ll start realizing the importance of recycling,” he said. “And you know they are going to share it with their parents because they are already asking their parents for ideas for the project, what would work and what wouldn’t work.”

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Winners of the third annual 3R Challenge recently were announced.

Brownstown Central High School received the top prize of $500 for placing recycling bins throughout the school; building Christmas trees and stars out of wood from the Ewing Depot, having them sold at a local store and donating that money to the depot restoration project; and collecting metal cans used in the cafeteria and plastic soft drink bottles to be picked up by solid waste management officials. A class will use the winnings to create an educational recycling exhibit for the FFA’s Young MacDonald’s Farm building during the Jackson County Fair.

St. Ambrose Catholic School won $250 for creating a turkey using items reduced, reused and recycled from the school. It will put the prize money toward paying for the school’s playground surface, which is made from recycled materials.

Seymour-Redding Elementary School won $250 for creating projects using plastic bottles. The school will use the winnings to purchase a rain barrel that will enable students to use rain water to water flowers they plant and also reduce the amount of water used during the fall and spring months.

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