Koror, Palau – The Palau Pledge Cigarette Butt Challenge continues this year, with Airai Elementary School’s 8th grade class scooping first place with over 60 lbs of collected cigarette butts. This year will be the second time in a row that Airai Elementary School has taken first place in the Cigarette Butt Challenge! Congratulations!

The winning teams are as follows:

First Place – Airai Elementary School 8th Grade Class Second Place – Meyuns Elementary School 2nd Grade Class

Third Place – George B. Harris Elementary School 2nd Grade – Section B

This year, over 400 lbs of cigarette butts were collected by students all across Palau. In total, 2,100 lbs of cigarettes have been collected since the first Palau Pledge Cigarette Butt Challenge in 2019.

The Palau Pledge Cigarette Butt Challenge aims to educate and bring awareness to the negative impacts of cigarette butts on the environment. Contrary to the general belief that cigarette butts are created from cotton, they are formed of microplastics that do not biodegrade. These microplastics pollute our environment and our waters, then being mistaken for food by animals like fish and birds.