The City of Columbia is looking for volunteers to help educate residents about recycling practices. Columbia Public Works and the Columbia Volunteer Program are launching their newest volunteer opportunity in an effort to educate people about all the recycling options in the city of Columbia.
The Recycling Ambassadors Initiative will take volunteers through a two hour training that will teach them how to answer questions about proper recycling techniques, recycling myths and anything someone would need to know in order to use curbside recycling pick-up. The volunteers will work at festivals and events along with giving presentations around Columbia.
Andrea Shelton is a Volunteer Programs Specialist for the City of Columbia and hopes that teaching people recycling techniques will allow residents to have a greater impact in their community.
"We have a lot of citizens that are concerned about the environment, they're concerned about recycling, they are concerned about waste reduction issues but then on the other side all these citizens that are these great volunteers," said Shelton.
Shelton wrote the training manual that the volunteers will learn from during their meeting and says they will learn everything from recycling curbside pick-up to waste prevention and hazardous waste collection. She says the volunteers will start with learning about simple recycling practices for resident to use.
"We want to get people educated about how to use our recycling program first properly," said Shelton.
Leigh Britt is the Neighborhood Services Manager for the City of Columbia and works closely with the city of Columbia volunteer program. Britt says this program could be very effective because of how many possible volunteers there are in Columbia.
"We have just a vast volunteer resource in our community. We have a lot of people in our community that are willing to share their time and so this is a way that we can continue our history of having citizens as volunteers."
Shelton says the training for volunteers will also include lessons on how to communicate these ideas to other people effectively. Shelton says the communication skills will hopefully help volunteers when they work at festivals or give different presentations about recycling programs. The first training session for volunteer is scheduled for December 9, 6-8 p.m.
