SCHOOLS
eco eye
open your
Four high school students create a recycling app
By Sarah Rol l i ns | Photo by Cornel l Wat son
eeing recyclable items end up in trash cans is frustrating to many, but rather than ignore the problem, four students were inspired to create an app that makes recycling easier. East Chapel Hill High School sophomore Bo Chi and Chapel Hill High School sophomore Yichen Sun and juniors Ayden Xu and Savannah Xu are frequent volunteers for Chapel Hill nonprofit WE SENSE, which derives its name from its mission to “serve, engage, nurture, share and enrich” the community. WE SENSE often puts on creative and educational programs and service events, such as 2019’s Bloom Fest in downtown Chapel Hill, that promote environmental awareness. “WE SENSE provided us a platform to develop our own service learning interests and projects,” Bo says. Bo, Yichen, Ayden and 64
chapelhillmagazine.com
November 2020
Savannah then leveraged their knowledge and relationship with the nonprofit to create something on their own. In 2019, the group started their first project, “Go Green – Holiday Action,” which focused on spreading awareness of the increased waste generated during the holidays from things like gift packaging and more gatherings. “Our main inspiration was that we noticed people around us oftentimes misplaced [recyclable] items, so we wanted to fix that,” the team says. They hosted three holiday-themed events where they quizzed their 700 attendees’ knowledge on recycling, demonstrated DIY crafts using recycled materials and showcased their new app, EcoEye, which uses AI vision technology to classify various waste and its recyclability. “If you don’t know whether
