The Yukon Montesasori School may have just 26 students, but that didn’t stop them from taking the top Yukon prize this year in Northwestel Inc.’s annual directory recycling program. 

The small Whitehorse school collected 371 telephone directories, an average of more than 14 per student, and earned $750 from Northwestel to put toward their own environmental initiatives.

Principal Emily Hood said the students have been focused on reducing their environmental impact this year.

“We partnered with Zero Waste Yukon to create the ‘globe in a plastic bag’ branding and attended the Re:Design craft fair to speak about single-use plastic bags,” Hood said.

“The students also ‘caught’ and rewarded shoppers using reusable bags at Wykes Independent Grocer.

“ One of our aims here at YMS is to cultivate an understanding in students that reaches beyond themselves, into their community locally and globally.  We are so proud of these young souls.”

École Whitehorse Elementary School picked up a $500 bonus award as the Yukon school with the largest increase in the number of directories collected since 2018. 

Twenty-two schools from across the territory participated in this year’s challenge, saving 5,940 telephone directories from the landfill.

“I am continually impressed by our northern students and their commitment to the environment,” said Northwestel president Curtis Shaw. 

“The kids take initiative, selflessly collecting thousands of old directories in order to fundraise for their schools’ environmental programs. 

“Northwestel recognizes their efforts toward keeping communities green, and we are pleased to reward their success,” Shaw said. 

Participating northern British Columbia schools are continuing their collection efforts with this year’s directory recycling program, which will wrap up later this month. 

Since the program began in 2002, more than 197,000 directories have been collected and recycled by students across the Yukon, northern B.C., Nunavut and the Northwest Territories.