GTA TeleGuam Names School Winners in 2nd Annual Directory Recycling Contest

Astumbo Middle School gets grand prize; 15 schools share $10,000 in cash awards

TAMUNING, Guam – (April 24, 2010) – It seems the new school schooled other schools this year, in an environmentally-friendly, Guam way.

GTA TeleGuam’s 2nd Annual Phonebook Round Up contest winner this year was the newly opened Astumbo Middle School. The new Dededo School with 578 students collected 16,115 phonebooks, or an average of 28 outdated phonebooks per student and almost twice as many as the 2nd place runner-up. The first place grand prize was a $3,000 cash award plus a tree planting ceremony on the school’s campus.

“Astumbo Middle School wrote the lesson plan for others to follow with the success of their phonebook roundup campaign,” said Karen Gayle, GTA YellowBook project manager for GTA TeleGuam. “They are an inspiration to us all to learn the importance of recycling as well as to take responsibility for preserving the island’s natural beauty and natural resources.”

Students in about 40 public, private and federal schools collected 69,667 outdated telephone directories, almost double the number last year. The annual contest is part of GTA TeleGuam’s overall Green strategy to achieve positive outcomes for the environment and island.

GTA TeleGuam named this year’s contest winners Saturday during the Guahan Earth Festival at Gov. Joseph Flores (Ypao) Beach Park in Tumon.

Second place winner was FB Leon Guerrero Middle School with 9,210 phone books collected. George Washington High School was close behind in third place with 8,312 phone books collected. Second and third place winners received cash prizes of $2,000 and $1,000, respectively. The top 15 schools based on the number of books they collected shared cash award prizes totaling $10,000.

Outdated phone books are shredded turned into usable recycled materials and donated to local farmers in need as filler and mulching. Through the collective efforts of Guam’s school children, a total of 277 cubic yards of landfill space was spared.

“GTA TeleGuam would also like to thank our partners in the 2010 GTA TeleGuam Phonebook Round Up including Peggy Denney of iRecycle, South Pacific Environmental, Roland Quitugua of Soil and Water Conservation Northern District, and the Pacific Daily News for their support and dedication to this project.” Gayle said.

GTA TeleGuam is committed to environmentally responsible business practices, which includes 100 percent recyclable directories with safe inks, dyes and high percentages of post-consumer recycled material.

About GTA TeleGuam

GTA TeleGuam provides complete communications services on Guam. These include local and long-distance telephone service, 3G wireless, DSL Internet access, and advanced digital television, or IPTV. The company also operates a data center on Guam for offering business data storage and managed wide area networking. Based in Tamuning, Guam, GTA TeleGuam is privately owned and locally managed. Shamrock Capital Advisors, a California-based private equity firm founded as the Roy E. Disney Family investment company, and GE provide financial backing to GTA TeleGuam. The company’s website is www.gta.net. Phone: 1-671-644-4482.