Multi-Purpose Pallets Go to Back-to-School

There are over 29 million meals provided daily by the National School Lunch Program. Many items in each meal arrive at school packaged on pallets. Pallets are also used for storage in the lunchroom. Dry goods, for example, can be stored on dollies, racks, or pallets that are easily moveable. When pallets are no longer needed, many schools work with their foodservice distributors to set up a recycling program. In a typical pallet exchange program, pallets are picked up for reuse instead of being sent to a landfill.

However, schools are also finding ways to re-use pallets in the classroom for hands-on learning activities. At a high school in Idaho, for example, an agri-science teacher taught students how to upcycle pallets into garden boxes. The finished boxes were then sold at a local farmers market.

In their immediate area, there are many food-processing plants with old, discarded pallets. The students were able to use this material for the project. Students leveraged their math skills to measure the pallet wood, hand-eye coordination to construct the boxes, and business skills to sell the finished product at the market. In the process, they also learned more about the science of gardening including soil composition and nutrients as well as insects that live within a garden biosphere. Read more about it here.

We think it’s remarkable to see how pallets can serve multi-purposes in our education system. It makes us especially grateful to provide pallets for clients in the foodservice industry that process and distribute food to schools around the country.

Do you have an interesting story involving pallets?  Simply comment below—we’d be happy to highlight it here on our blog. And, as always, for all your pallet management needs, contact the pros at Rose Pallet!