Youth-Oriented Recycling and Rubbish Exhibit Debuts
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
May 18, 2001
Joe Wills
530-898-4143
Youth-Oriented Recycling and Rubbish Exhibit Debuts
A museum exhibit with special appeal to children devoted to the history of trash has come to Butte County.
California State University, Chico, working jointly with Butte County Department of Public Works, and with the assistance of county businesses and CSU, Chico students, is opening the Recycling and Rubbish Exhibit, known as R.A.R.E.
A news conference to introduce R.A.R.E. will be held Tuesday, May 22, at 10 a.m. at the exhibit site, located at 3097 Suite #2 Southgate Lane.
The exhibit will be opening this fall. It will be free and open primarily to tours of elementary school-age children. CSU, Chico students will operate the exhibit and lead tours as docents.
R.A.R.E. has more than 20 interactive displays that describe practices of throwing things away and recycling them throughout human history. Aspects of geosciences, anthropology, sociology and economics as well as history are related through the displays.
The importance of waste and recycling is underscored in the exhibit, given the increasing cost and requirements related to landfills.
While the exhibit educates adults and children about waste practices, it has displays for the young and young at heart. Included in the exhibit are a walk-through compost bin and a 5-foot-tall garbage can. As a flier to advertise the exhibit to schoolteachers proclaims, “At the end of the visit, your students will become certified ‘Garbologists!’”
The exhibit was constructed for $100,000 in 1991 and displayed at the Discovery Science Museum in Sacramento. It toured the country between 1992 and 1996, including a stop at the Chico Museum. Innovative methods of using recycled paper, paint and lumber went into the construction of the exhibit.
Bobbie Knapp, a Discovery Science Museum employee and CSU, Chico parent, recommended that the exhibit have a permanent home in Chico. Norcal Waste Systems of Butte County donated the exhibit site, and CSU, Chico and Butte County cooperated on relocating the exhibit.
The Associated Students Recycling Program and Recycling Education Outreach are also sponsors of the exhibit.
CSU, Chico professor Mark Stemen and Norcal general manager Joe Matts will address the media at the May 22 news conference.
For more information about the exhibit or the news conference, contact the A.S. Recycling Program at 898-5033.
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