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    Les tawashis de MiniRecy

    Provincial prizewinner

    OSEntreprendre Challenge

    A school-based enterprise, Les tawashis de MiniRecy, took worn shirts, pants and socks that would normally have been tossed into the trash, tore them into strips and transformed them into ecological sponges.

    Having noticed how many articles of clothing were being thrown out by their own families, the language development students at Saint-Viateur-Clotilde-Raymond elementary school decided to develop a product made entirely from recycled fabric. This goal of this project was to cut down the amount of waste generated by the community, thus reducing its ecological footprint. A simple and effective solution, true, but it took the entrepreneurial spirit of these young people to come up with it!

    Level of education

    Elementary Cycle One (Elementary 1 and 2)

    Students involved

    14 Students

    Nature of the project

    Product

    Results observed

    The project grew much larger than planned. Although the students only sought to raise awareness in the community about the wastefulness of discarding clothing—a goal they achieved—they actually managed to reach a much larger audience! Their know-how and ability to co-operate enabled them to produce 300 tawashis in a year, though they had only projected making 100. This proved to be a huge boost to their self-confidence and left them with a strong sense of accomplishment.

    Involvement and support

    Several municipalities and Internet figures mobilized to provide the young entrepreneurs with fabric so they could make tawashis. These included the children's clothing company Giraldof, which donated unused fabric. Ricardo Larivée and his assistant, Élaine Martin, also encouraged the project. A group of St-Jean bikers helped promote the tawashis and raised funds. The Dragons' Den team offered to pay for a graphic artist to design a web page for this project. Any fabric scraps were then recycled by Certex.

    Major steps

    • Students learnt to make tawashis
    • Project timeline established and committees struck
    • Enterprise created
    • Products marketed
    • Products sold

    Project materials needed

    • Computer
    • Old clothes
    • Weaving supplies

    Connection with the Québec Education Program

    Education Through Entrepreneurial Spirit is excellent for integrating skills from the Preschool and elementary education program and the Secondary education program.

    Broad Areas of Learning

    Subject Areas

    Intellectual competencies

    Methodological competency

    Communication-Related competency

    Personal and social competency

    Positive influences on student retention

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