It's never too soon to teach children that trashing our state is not a viable option. That's why PalmettoPride is working with public schools to develop in our young people a healthy disdain for the embarrassingly expansive litter that has long marred many of our otherwise scenic landscapes.
As Seanna Adcox recently reported in The Post and Courier, an age-based curriculum developed by a group of 12 teachers was released in October to advance this goal, and is now being implemented in some public schools. Rebecca Barnes, coordinator of PalmettoPride, explained: "What we're trying to do is change the behavior that creates litter. The easiest way to do that is to make certain the behavior never starts. We're trying to get our anti-litter message into the classroom when kids enter kindergarten."
That anti-litter message already has been getting through across a wide range of ages. Started nearly five years ago as a nonprofit organization, in part as a response to University of South Carolina football coach Lou Holtz' well-placed laments of our state's untidy appearance, PalmettoPride apparently has helped slow the litter rate. The state reports that litter collected along our interstate highways has declined 32 percent since 2000, and the Sea Grant Consortium reports that the amount of debris collected along coastal marshes declined by 3,000 pounds from 2002 to 2003 -- despite a significant rise in the number of volunteers doing that dirty work.
Yet approximately 28,000 pounds were still collected -- 16,000 in Charleston, Berkeley and Dorchester County. Some of that trash was gathered by school students, including members of the Hanahan High School Science Club. Hanahan teacher Edna Jordan, the club's sponsor, told our reporter that the benefits of her students' efforts went beyond the litter they removed: "If they weren't conscientious before, I know they don't litter after the sweep because it disgusts them."
And if adults aren't as conscientious as they should be about litter, emphasizing its consequences to impressionable youth is a common-sense step toward a cleaner future for South Carolina.
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