The family gathered this weekend to celebrate my brother-in-law's birthday. Knowing that I was going to be joining them, my 11-year-old nephew Ethan proudly wore a t-shirt that made the following argument: "Trees make air. Homework kills trees. Homework causes GLOBAL WARMING!"

Yes, the shirt does take a somewhat large leap in logic between sentences two and three. But obviously I'm thrilled that my nephew feels so strongly about the issue that he's willing to wear a t-shirt about it. And hey, if it will take a ban on homework to get young people engaged with stopping global warming than I say let's ban homework. But before all the parents in the crowd start to pelt me with rocks, I actually don't think we have to go that far.

If you got to the very very end of Monday's front-page story in New York Times about the plummeting value of recycled materials, you'll see what I mean. Of course if you got that far in that very depressing story, you are probably a recycling nut like me. For all the normal people out there, let me provide a summary:

The collapse of the market is slowing the momentum of recycling overall, said Mark Arzoumanian, editor in chief of Official Board Markets. He said the problem would hurt individual recycling businesses, but also major retailers, like Wal-Mart Stores, that profit by selling refuse.

Mr. Arzoumanian said paper mills in China and the United States that had signed contracts requiring them to buy recycled paper were seeking wiggle room, invoking clauses that cover extraordinary circumstances. "They are declaring ‘force majeure,' which is a phrase I'd never thought I'd hear in paper recycling," he said.

Mr. Arzoumanian and others said mills were also starting to become pickier about what they take in, rejecting cardboard and other products that they say are "contaminated" by plastic ties or other material.

The thrust of the Times story is that selling recycled material is no longer the money maker that it once was. And that's causing some municipalities and other government body to give up on it despite the overwhelming societal benefit recycling provides.

And that's where I got my hope. Times reporters Matt Richtel and Kate Galbraith write about a second-grade class at Ruthlawn Elementary School in South Charleston, W.V., that learned that its brand new recycling program was about to be ended.

They chose to forgo recess and instead use the time to write letters to the governor and mayor, imploring them to keep recycling, Rachel Fisk, their teacher, said.

The students' pleas seem to have been heard; the city plans to start trucking the recyclables to Kentucky.

"They were telling them, ‘We really don't care what you say about the economy. If you don't recycle, our planet will be dirty,' " Ms. Fisk said.

Second-grade activists supporting recycling and taking action for the planet. Is there anything that could an environmentalist happier? Nope, I can't think of anything. Not even banning homework, which, btw, for any younger readers out there, doesn't end when you graduate ... its just called bringing work home from the office and it happens an awful lot. Sorry bout that.