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Some students at Bladensburg High School say living "green" should begin within school walls and have embarked on a campaign to start a school recycling program.

Student Government Association President Jennifer Avelar has a passion for environmental conservation, something she imparts to the municipal governments, teachers and administrators she talks to in her effort to get recycling at the school.

Avelar, a 17-year-old Cheverly resident, recycles at home and learned about the environmental impact recycling has during volunteer work with various eco-friendly civic groups.

"I figured one of the best ways [to help the environment], even if it seems small, is recycling, because it actually does have a big impact," she said.

Avelar, a senior, wants to have a program in place before she graduates. The first step, she said, is to educate the public about the importance of recycling.

SGA advisor Jimi Wills said Avelar found a recycling company last year to partner with the school, but it went out of business shortly thereafter.

"She's absolutely on a mission to make sure we're set up before she graduates," Wills said.

Avelar is now looking for help from municipal governments to add Bladensburg High to their recycling pick-up routes. She brought her idea to the town of Bladensburg for the first time during a Monday night Town Council meeting and may bring the idea before other councils in nearby towns.

Mayor Walter James said the idea was new and hasn't been formally discussed by the council, but he expects the town to be in favor.

"We believe it's something beneficial and great, but we haven't had any kind of formal discussions about it," he said. "It's something that, as mayor, that I'm very interested in."

The town has been recycling since before James began serving on the council in 2003, and he said adding Bladensburg High to the town's recycling routes wouldn't put any strain on the budget. The majority of the town's budget is dedicated to public safety, he added.

Some schools in Prince George's County recycle paper through the school system's Litter Free Schools program. Bladensburg High School is not enrolled in the program. To get a school recycling non-paper products is a longer process, school spokeswoman Lynn McCawley said.

"It's more involved, and what's held us up in the past is that we do our own trash collection in the school system, and we don't have a recycling truck," she said. "In order to do recycling in-house, we need a recycling truck."

The school system recently switched recycling companies and is in the process of switching schools that recycled under the old company to the new company. That transition needs to be completed before the school system can recruit any more new schools to recycle, McCawley added.

Last year the school system had a campaign to get all elementary schools recycling, and this year it will expand to middle and high schools once the conversion process is complete, McCawley said.

But schools under Litter Free Schools only recycle paper, and Avelar said she would like to see her school recycling other material, such as plastic and aluminum.

Fellow classmate Ricqa Ogaro, a 16-year-old senior from Landover Hills, agreed. She said she first began thinking about recycling when talking to a friend about students' trash.

"We were talking about how this school wasted so much paper, and when we're done with it, it's just thrown away," she said. "And we all have drinks and soda and stuff. It's really just a matter of labeling trash cans [for recycling]."

Avelar also hopes to start a "green patrol" inside school walls. Students could earn service hours by volunteering as monitors who would ensure students throw away recyclables in the correct bins, she said.

"Wherever there are students with soft drinks or daily snacks, things tend to get thrown on the ground," she said. "[Recycling] would benefit everyone. The custodian staff would have an ease off their load. They wouldn't have to worry about students putting things in the right place."

E-mail Elahe Izadi at eizadi@gazette.net.