How can I stimulate better sanitation at my school?

This is a wonderful question. One of my personal VABEs and family principles is “Clean as you go: leave your campsite cleaner than you found it.” Here are some ideas:

1. Be a good role model, pick up trash when you see it. I do, even on the golf course or on the street or in my building.
2. Students in Japanese schools were/are involved in maintaining their schools. Organize a cleaning crew with logos, badges, and spend 30 - 60 minutes after school to clean up, even the bathrooms. Organize with school administration.
3. Hang up signs (with permission): “Cleanliness is next to godliness” and “Trash breeds disease!” or “Don’t be a Litter-Bug!” or … you make up some.
4. Meet with the school custodians to see how you and your “Cleaner Crew” (Polish Posse? Neatniks?) could help them.
5. Learn and teach to sneeze or cough INTO YOUR SHIRTS, not elbows or hands (yuck). Keep your germ cloud inside your shirt.
6. Be prepared to deal with mockers and scoffers. Don’t let them bother you. Cleanliness and neatness is a habit that will serve you well throughout your life.
7. Work with the school to provide trash cans at all the usual places—and help empty them.
8. Seek public or private funding for better sanitation systems if necessary.
9. Take pictures of trash (and rats) and post here and there to encourage people to “clean as you go.”
10. Organize your Cleaning Crew to clean up after sporting events.
11. Organize an award ceremony for the custodians. Recognize and respect what they do for you all!
12. Give out SMILEY FACE stickers to students who clean up or pick up. When you see someone picking up a piece of trash, put a yellow sticker on them or their backpack. See how many you can get. A Smiley Face on EVERY Backpack! 8=)
13. Organize a monthly award for Clean Colleague of the Month—with most stickers.
14. Have debates on the TRAGEDY OF THE COMMONS. That is, how abuse of the Common spaces (air, water, soil/land, flora, fauna, and the underprivileged) affect us all. Pictures of landfills, polluted air, water, etc. Why should we care about the Commons?

Maybe one or more of those will help you get started. Cleanliness is a habit. Don’t clean later, clean as you go. Don’t litter. Clean up your own messes. Remember, many students do not learn this at home. Positive encouragement will do better than criticism.