Carbon Co. students collect 22 tons of old phone books

Carbon County elementary students collected 22.10 tons of old phone books for recycling.

The 24,7000 books were collected by about 800 students for the contest, which has been held annually since 1996. So far, children have collected a total of 299,732 old telephone books that otherwise would be clogging landfills.

On Friday, Carbon County commissioners and the county's Department of Solid Waste will visit the participating schools and award the following prizes: One Certificate of Achievement to the school with the highest student collection ratio; five Outstanding Recycler awards along with savings bonds to the top five student collectors. The Jim Thorpe National Bank donated three $100 bonds and First National Bank of Palmerton donated two $100 bonds.

The officials will also award Outstanding Recycler Certificates of Merit to the top student collectors in schools not receiving other awards, and a certificate to the student who brought in the oldest dated telephone directory.

Here are the schools and their totals:

Lehighton Area School District:

Franklin: 2,016

Shull-David: 2,261

Mahoning: 4,589

East Penn: 1,997

Ss. Peter and Paul: 488

Palmerton Area

School District:

S.S. Palmer: 6,119

Towamensing: 1,471

St. John Neumann: 300

Jim Thorpe Area School District:

St. Joseph's Regional Academy: 310

L.B. Morris: 832

Weatherly: 4,317