Contests, Grants, & Fundraisers

All Grades

Zero Waste Schools (Grades PK-12)
An exciting new social media platform where NYC students and teachers can celebrate what they are doing to protect our environment - and win prizes too! Once you have signed up with you school's validation code, you can enter numerous mini-contests! 
To find out your school's validation code, email: schools@dsny.nyc.gov
      How to enter Contests

Annual AF&PA Recycling Awards (Grades PK-12)
Schools recieve cash prizes, in addition to local and national recognition, for their efforts in recycling paper.

New York Recycles! Poster Contest (Grades PK-12)
Students submit artwork on the them of recycling. Open for entries from public and private schools, students receive prizes and state recognition for winning artwork, and have their poster featured in the annual calendar. Winning schools also receive recycling education curricula.

Donor's Choose (Grades PK-12)
Do you need financial support for new recycling bins or other sustainabiltiy projects in your school?  DonorsChoose.org is an online charity that makes it easy for anyone to help students in need.

Grow to Learn NYC: The Citywide School Gardens Initiative (Grades PK-12)
Are you interested in starting a scchool garden or improving the one you already have?  Grow to Learn awards mini-grants of $500 to $2,000!  

Keep America Beautiful Recycle Bowl (Grades K-12)
Compete against other schools in your state and nationwide to see who recycles the most. GREAT PRIZES for top performers!  

NYSAR3
New York State Association for Reduction, Reuse, and Recycling Inc. Seed money may be available for your school's recycling program!

Catalog Canceling Challenge (Grades 4-12)
19 billion catalogs are mailed out every year. All across the country students are canceling catalogs by the hundreds and thousands, find out how to be a part of the effort and start reducing at your school.

Elmer's Glue Crew (Grades K-12)
Collect your classroom's empty glue bottles and glue sticks. Elmer's Glue will help you recycle them and give you a chance to help save the planet while being eligible to win cash prizes!

Getting Tools to City Schools
Every school year, students need new notebooks and binders. Getting Schools to City Schools offers sustainable binders that can be reused every year. The binders are made from 100% recycled materials, and all proceeds from purchases go towards providing NYC schools with free school supplies.

Materials for the Arts (Grades PK-12)
Materials for the Arts gathers supplies from companies and individuals that no longer need them and redistributes them to educators who can reuse them. 

Office Depot: My School Recycles (Grades PK-12)
Earn free supplies for your school by recycling printer cartidges and small electronics! Office Depot will send you the collection boxes and pay for the shipping, this is a great recycling drive to set up in your school's main office.

TerraCycle (Grades PK-12)
TerraCycle is a local, New Jersey company that transforms materials that can't be recycled into useful and cool everyday products. Earn money for your school by collecting juice pouches, candy wrappers, and other materials.

Wearable Collections (Grades PK-12)
Materials like clothing and linens make up almost 6% of NYC's waste, the City throws out 193,000 tons of textiles every year! Host a textiles collection drive at your school and Wearable Collections will come and pick up what you've collected and pay you for the textiles.

Every year, GrowNYC holds our Annual Spring Plant Sale in order to provide community groups with affordable perennial and annual flowering plants, herbs, ground covers, and vegetables grown by Greenmarket farmers and sold in wholesale quantities.