A dumpster full of books..... :(

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The elementary school down the street is very nice to the neighborhood dog owners, allowing us to run our dogs in the field after school hours, as long as we clean up after them. They provide a trash can near the field and ask us to occasionally dump the contents in the dumpster. So we do.

Today I was walking with my dog and he pooped while we were closer to the dumpster than the trash can. I cleaned up the poop and headed over to drop it in the dumpster. When I opened the lid I saw that the dumpster was full of books. Mostly picture books.

I'm a bit pissed about this.

Mo went to that school and they constantly nagged us to buy books for the classrooms and the library and to give to the low income families in the district.

I understand that classroom books might get torn up or damaged and need to be tossed, but a dumpster full of books? These books looked to be in pretty good shape but I didn't go digging through them.

I'm thinking about going back over there to take a photo to send to the principal.

Should I?

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Type: Question • Score: 20 • Views: 11,146 • Replies: 148

@boomerang,

Yes.

1 Reply

@boomerang,

Hell, yes.

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@ossobuco,

This reminds me of the mower episode.

I'm from california as a lot of people know, so I'm naturally used to leaf blowers. This is tough for people who work from home in neighborhoods with tiny houses with gardeners.

We lived across the street from an elementary school, which was as interesting in some ways as it was sometimes annoying as hell. One day I saw a gardener chasing one leaf with this giant, and I do mean giant, mower/leaf blower. Well, I heard it first. Took a photo.
Got it developed. Went to the principal.
Never saw that big sucker again.
It was almost funny, but not.

Act now.

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@boomerang,

Are there any good recycling services for kids' books in your area, boomerang?
If so, you might contact the principal with a list of them.
I hate seeing books treated like that, when I know there are people who can't afford to buy them for their children. Or simply aren't interested in buying them. I love the idea of free books for kids!
As to the photograph: maybe. I'm not sure.
It might just be enough to let the principal know how you became aware of all those dumped books when/if you suggest a better use for them?

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I might be more subversive. I might call the trash collection folks, on the administrative side. Or, not subversive, straightforward.
We did some designing for a large garbage collection depot. They may be able to intercept that.

1 Reply

@msolga,

Yes, there are, there are lots and lots of places that will help books get into the hands of kids who need books. (And if the books are very damaged they can go in the recycling bins and whoever put these books in the bin didn't even do that.)

I don't want to cause problems for the school and I love the principal who I know would be upset by this -- she taught in a low income school for many years so she is very aware of the hardship many children face.

I don't want to jump to conclusions. Maybe something is wrong with the books. I think that I might head down their later, when I know the building is empty, and investigate further.

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@ossobuco,

My initial reaction was to stomp around yelling "BULLSHIT" but then I calmed down.

I love books. The whole thing felt like a punch in the gut.

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yes yes yes

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@boomerang,

Quote:

I don't want to jump to conclusions. Maybe something is wrong with the books. I think that I might head down their later, when I know the building is empty, and investigate further.

Good idea.
Check out the condition of the books first, before/if you decide to make contact.
(But even if they are in poor condition, I'm wondering if they can be pulped/recycled? Better than being treated as trash, especially if there are quite a lot of them, or this happens on a regular basis.)

Quote:

I don't want to cause problems for the school and I love the principal who I know would be upset by this -- she taught in a low income school for many years so she is very aware of the hardship many children face.

You never know, boomerang, the principal might not even be aware that all of those books ended up in the dumpster. It happens ... some department or the library has a big clean-up & that's the quickest way to get rid of unwanted old stock ...
I agree with you not wanting to embarrass the principal or the school, or make the book dumping some local "issue".
Sometimes the best resolutions can found through quieter, more diplomatic means. Wink

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@boomerang,

boomerang wrote:

I'm thinking about going back over there to take a photo to send to the principal.

Should I?

No. Take the photograph and mail one copy to your city counselor, one copy to your mayor or town manager, and one copy to your most respected media source (newspaper).

1 Reply

Mo and I wandered down there but the building was still full of people. We ran into a teacher we knew so we aborted the mission and will try again later.

When I get a photo and more information I'll post it here.

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@tsarstepan,

I really don't want to cause problems for the school. But I would really like to not see this kind of thing happen again.

I doubt the principal is aware of it. I can guess which classroom they came from and Mo might be able to pinpoint it.

2 Replies

@boomerang,

But why would the principal not be aware of such a major decision in his school?

1 Reply

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@boomerang,

Don't get your panties in a bunch.
I hate books, and I hate them so much that I've burned some. I've burnt the bible, the quran, all the harry potter books, one of my history books, one of my sisters' twilight books, and I can't wait to burn more.
If I were you I'd have taken those books to my house, started a bonfire and sing Kumbaya.

1 Reply

@boomerang,

boomerang wrote:

Mo went to that school and they constantly nagged us to buy books for the classrooms and the library and to give to the low income families in the district.

<snip>

I'm thinking about going back over there to take a photo to send to the principal.

Should I?

Yes, especially since they were so disrespectful of the people who did come through with books for them.

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A tangent, but not all so much..

http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/aug/31/zadie-smith-defends-local-libraries?newsfeed=true

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@tsarstepan,

Quote:

But why would the principal not be aware of such a major decision in his school?

Tsar, I don't think that rationalizing/clearing out no-longer-wanted resources would be considered a major decision in any school.
These "cleanings-ups" happen all the time, whether books, equipment or materials.
Usually decisions about such things would be the responsibility of the various department heads in schools.
The question here, of course, is could anyone else make good use of the no-longer-wanted resources? Is there a better way to dispose of them than putting them in the dumpster along with garbage?

1 Reply

@boomerang,

Send the picture to a local newspaper.

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@msolga,

Absolutely.

My outrage was more about how wasteful it is. There are schools/kids/shelters/places that could really use these books. Some of the kids at this school would have loved to have these books -- with school opening in just a few days it would have been so easy to put a "free" sign on them and let people take them home.

Mo and I went back -- the photos are uploading but they're kind of awful -- it's hard to photograph garbage in a dumpster that is as tall as you are.

We pulled out a couple of books and they're perfect. Not even the covers are bent. So weird that they were thrown away.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v667/boomerangagain/DSC_0736.jpg

This is the pink/white box in the foreground of the last photo:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v667/boomerangagain/DSC_0730.jpg

Behind the pink/white box:

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v667/boomerangagain/DSC_0731.jpg

There were a few more boxes of books underneath these boxes but I couldn't really get a shot of them.

1 Reply

A dumpster full of books..... :(

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