Wylandville Elementary Promotes
Kindness with the Buddy Bench Project
“T
o make friends with
everyone even if you don’t
know them. Everyone has
something special to offer.” This was
the response that student Abby
Zirngibl gave when she was asked
what she hopes the students and the
district learn from the Buddy Bench
Project. So what is the Buddy Bench
Project and how did it start?
The Buddy Bench Project began
when Abby’s sister Mady came home
from school one day and mentioned
how one of her friends was alone at
recess. Luckily Mady was there for her
friend and comforted her during the
rough time she was having at home
by asking her to play. Mady’s mom
reminded her of the buddy benches
that they saw over the summer at
another school district and explained
that the exact experience Mady had
was what the Buddy Benches were
for. If a student has nobody to play
with during recess, they simply sit on
the bench and wait for another kid
to invite them to play. When Mady
remembered these benches her face
lit up and she immediately wanted
to bring the benches to Wylandville
Elementary so that no more students Front row: Abby Powers (grade 3), Shane Martin (grade 3), Mady Zirngibl (grade 3), Aurelia Gigliotti
would feel alone or sad during recess. (grade 3), Hadley Sherman (grade 3)
Back row: Mrs. Jennifer Ford, School Counselor, Nina Stella (grade 5), Abby Zirngibl (grade 5), Mrs.
After meeting with Principal Mrs.
Shannon Balch, Principal
Shannon Balch to discuss different
ways they could bring the Buddy
NOT be donated to the project included: Ziploc bags, fast food
Bench to Wylandville, and conducting some research, they
lids, grocery store bags, soap or lotion pumps, all food containers,
discovered the Green Tree Plastics company that turned
K-Cups and straws. Mrs. Zirngibl said they started this project in
recycled projects into things like tables, planters and benches!
January 2019 and by June they had already collected over 700
And so the project began. The Zirngibl family bought and
bottle caps! Not only did the students and faculty at Wylandville
donated two books that detailed friendships and Buddy
assist with this project but family members, like Colby Foster’s
Benches, one for early grades and one for the older grades. The
grandmother, assisted by asking their coworkers to donate some
Wylandville teachers used these books as a way to kick-off this
bottle caps as well! It became a community effort and a fantastic
project. Mrs. Michelle Zirngibl then invited a core leadership
opportunity to teach the kids about kindness and the
team of students (pictured) over to create signs and buckets
importance of recycling as well.
that would be placed around the school to collect the
Once enough of the bottle caps were collected
bottle caps. Fliers were also created to help explain the
the Zirngibl family invited the core leadership
program and describe what kind of bottle caps were
team (pictured) over to their house during the
acceptable to recycle in the project, such as: drink
summer to sort, clean and weigh all of the
bottle caps, medicine bottle caps, milk, toothpaste,
bottle caps. After they knew that they had
ketchup lids, applesauce pouch caps, shampoo/
collected enough the appointment with
conditioner caps, peanut butter and Pringles lids
Green Tree Plastics was made.
and Mayonnaise lids. Some bottle caps that could
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CANON-MAC